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HYDERABAD, MONDAY APRIL 12, 2021; PAGES 12 `3

www.dailypioneer.com

RNI No. TELENG/2018/76469

Established 1864Published From

HYDERABAD DELHI LUCKNOWBHOPAL RAIPUR CHANDIGARH

BHUBANESWAR RANCHIDEHRADUN VIJAYAWADA

*LATE CITY VOL. 3 ISSUE 170*Air Surcharge Extra if Applicable

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MONEY 8FRANKLIN UNITHOLDERS TO GET RS 2,962 CR IN SECOND TRANCHE

ANALYSIS 7THE BIG TENT OF THE

PPP DECODED

SPORTS 12RANA,TRIPATHI POWER

KKR TO 187

}{

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Page 11

PAWAN ISOLATESSELF AS PERSONAL

STAFF TEST POSITIVE FOR COVID

3

Maternal healthshould get priority dur-

ing Covid: Experts

5

‘India to manufac-ture containers, eyes

Rs 1,000 croreinvestment’

8

TSRTC cargo servicewins appreciation

from citizens

TN CONG CANDIDATE MADHAVA RAODIES OF COVID, BY-POLL IF HE WINS

ACongress candidate from Tamil Nadu has diedof COVID-19, a few days after he contestedfrom the Srivilliputhur constituency in the

state assembly elections. Congress candidatePSW Madhava Rao died of complications at ahospital today after being infected withcoronavirus last month. As he died afterelections, there won't be any re-polling. If hewins from his constituency in Virudhunagardistrict, a by-election will be held. All India CongressCommittee (AICC) secretary in-charge of Tamil Naduand Puducherry on Twitter said: "Deeply pained to learn about the saddemise of INCTamilNadu Leader and Srivilliputhur Assembly Congresscandidate Shri MadhavaRao, due to Covid complications."

FOURTH COVID WAVE IN DELHI ‘MUCHMORE DANGEROUS,’ SAYS KEJRIWAL

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal todayrequested the centre to remove agerestrictions on COVID-19

vaccination, even as his governmentflagged vaccine shortage and said thatstocks for just seven to 10 days are left.He said that the surge in COVID-19 casesthis time is "worse" than what Delhi sawduring the third peak. This is the fourthwave in Delhi which is "much moredangerous", he added. The chief minister alsosaid that a full lockdown is not the solution to tackle thepandemic, a day after announcing several new restrictionsamid an alarming rise in coronavirus cases in Delhi.

‘CANCEL CLASS 10, 12 BOARD EXAMS’:PRIYANKA GANDHI VADRA TO CENTRE

Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra hasurged Education Minister RameshPokhriyal to re-think holding board

exams for Class 10 and 12 CBSE schoolstudents as the number of daily new Covidcases in the country - over 1.5 lakh werereported this morning - continues to climb.Ms Gandhi Vadra, who is self-isolating at herDelhi home after her husband, Robert Vadra,tested positive for coronavirus, wrote to MrPokhriyal to underline the "fears and apprehensions...of lakhs of children and parents from all over India", and pointed outthe contradiction in warning adults against congregating in largenumbers while children would have to do the same.

UAE SELECTS FIRST ARAB WOMANFOR SPACE PROGRAMME

The United Arab Emirates has selectedthe first Arab woman to train as anastronaut, as the Gulf country

rapidly expands into the space sec-tor to diversify its economy. Emiratinational Nora al-Matrooshi, a 27-year-old mechanical engineeringgraduate currently working at AbuDhabi's National PetroleumConstruction Company, will join NASA's2021 Astronaut Candidate Class in theUnited States.The UAE is using its space programme todevelop its scientific and technological capabilities andreduce its reliance on oil.

PNS n NEW DELHI

The active COVID-19 cases in Indiabreached the 11 lakh-mark for thefirst time after a record high of 1.52lakh new infections while a massivevaccination push, dubbed by PrimeMinister Narendra Modi as thebeginning of another major waragainst coronavirus, was launchedon Sunday in a bid to abate the surge.

The active caseload till now wasat its lowest at 1,35,926 on February12 and at its highest at 10,17,754 onSeptember 18, 2020.

Amid an unprecedented burdenon health infrastructure in 15states and Delhi, which are witness-ing an upward trajectory, author-ities have started reserving more

COVID hospitals and taking stepsto address any shortage of medicalsupplies, besides enhancing curbson the movement of people.

PM says ‘Tika Utsav'another major warIndia's active cases breach 11 lakh-mark for first time

Government prohibitsexports of remdesivirPNS n NEW DELHI

In view of increased demand forremdesivir due to a surge inCOVID-19 cases, the Centre onSunday said the export of theantiviral injection and its ActivePharmaceutical Ingredients (API)has been banned till the situationimproves.

In addition, to ensure easyaccess of the drug, which is usedin treatment of coronavirus, to hos-pitals and patients, all domesticmanufacturers of remdesivir havebeen advised to display on theirwebsite details of their stockistsand distributors, the Union HealthMinistry said. Drugs inspectorsand other officers have been direct-ed to verify stocks, check malprac-tices and also take other effectiveactions to curb hoarding and blackmarketing. State health secretarieswill review this along with druginspectors of the respective statesand UTs, it said.

"India is witnessing a recent

surge in COVID cases. As on April11, there are 11.08 lakh active casesand they are steadily increasing.This has led to a sudden spike indemand for remdesivir injectionused in treatment of COVIDpatients," the ministry said.

There is a potential for furtherincrease in this demand in thecoming days, it stated.

PNS n HYDERABAD

With the aim of preventing thespread of COVID-19, now in its sec-ond wave, the Telangana govt onSunday issued a government orderabout compulsory wearing of masksacross the state. The authorities willimpose a fine of Rs 1,000 on any cit-izen who fails to wear masks whilestepping out. According to the GO,wearing of face masks has beenmade mandatory at all public places,work spaces and means of transport.Failure to wear a face mask as man-dated shall attract a penalty ofRs1,000.

The state government hasinstructed all the Collectors &District Magistrates andCommissioners / Superintendentsof Police in the state to strictly imple-ment the same.

The GO Ms 82 reads, "It has alsobeen mandated that any deviationin this regard shall attract prosecu-

tion under section 51 to 60 ofDisaster Management Act, 2005 andsection 188, IPC as well as otherapplicable laws. In exercise of pow-ers conferred under the DisasterManagement Act 2005, StateExecutive Committee issues direc-tions to all Collectors & DistrictMagistrates and Commissioners /Superintendents of Police in the stateto strictly implement the aboveinstructions".

TS doctors to Govt: Suspend surgeriesANUSHA PUPPALAn HYDERABAD

There's urgent need to suspendelective surgeries for at least thenext two months in COVID-19dedicated hospitals, say theTelangana Doctors Associationand the Indian MedicalAssociation.

According to the doctors' associ-ations, premiere institutions acrossthe country had already issuedorders to suspend elective surgeriesso as to avoid patient load andenable full utilization of the servic-es of existing staff for Covid patients.

Premier institutes like the AllIndia Institute Of MedicalSciences(AIIMS) and theJawaharlal Institute ofPostgraduate Medical Educationand Research(JIPMER) havedecided to discontinue all electiveadmissions with effect from April

10, 2021, which will help in bet-ter utilisation of manpower andresources for the COVID block.

Both the institutions havedecided to continue only urgentprocedures/surgeries in various

operation theatres. JIPMER hasdecided to continue Elective OTservices for a few days till patientsalready admitted are treated.

PNS n HYDERABAD

Close on the heels of the stategovernment extending relief toprivate teachers as well asadministrative, laboratory and asection of support staff such assweepers, it has been decided toextend the aid of 25kg of rice andRs 2,000 to bus drivers and ayahsof private schools.

Hitherto the facility wasextended to private teachers, clerks,accountants, library staff, labassistants, attendants and sweepers.Now bus drivers and ayahs wouldalso be able to derive benefit underthe scheme. The education

department officials have issuedoral orders in this regard. Eventhose whose particulars are notrecorded in UDISE can apply toderive benefit, provided theyproduce evidence of working in theschool.

Govt to provide 25 kg rice, Rs 2Kto private school bus drivers, ayahs

Punters get going as IPL season starts; lakhs change handsSNCN ACHARYULUn HYDERABAD

When IPL season begins, canpunters be far behind. After elec-tions, perhaps cricket is the mostfertile area for betting and natu-rally punters are now busy as IPLmatches have started.

The only difference if any thistime is that punters are bettingonline and offline. Initially bettingwas more popular in the coastaldistricts of Andhra Pradesh thanin Telangana. Over the years, thebetting habit has per vadedTelangana areas also. There are

online sites specializing in 'guid-ing' punters for betting in the IPLmatches.

Before the start of the matchevery day, these websites sitesput out reviews of the perform-ance of each team, apart from giv-ing dope on every player's form.Besides, some of these sites areconducting betting. They are deal-ing with bets on Man of theMatch, Man of the Series, apartfrom ball-to-ball bets. They alsooffer bets on runs scored perover. For example, while the matchis in progress, they ask about eachball: will the batsman hit four or

six. Besides, there are individualbets, mostly between two persons.

Individual bets are more promi-

nent in East Godavari and WestGodavari. In these two districts,on every issue individual bets

have become the order of the day.Betting organisers earn money bycollecting some commission frompunters. In the bettings on IPLmatches, lakhs of rupees arechanging hands. The India vsPakistan matches attract recordlevel betting amounts.

Bettings in cricket are not con-fined to only one section; politi-cians, businessmen, students andothers are also involved in it.Mumbai is the main headquartersfor betting organizers, be it forpolitics or cricket.

TRS, Congress busy with surveys in N’SagarPNS n HYDERABAD

With the date for polling in theNagarjuna Sagar Assembly seatbye-lection fast approaching, majorpolitical parties in TS have reliedon their internal surveys toassert their own victories.

The TelanganaRashtra Samithi (TRS)and Congress party areconfident of their vic-tory. Both parties citesurveys conducted bythem to assert the victory oftheir candidates.

According to sources, thesurvey conducted by TRSrevealed that in theNagarjuna Sagar bye-election, the differenceof vote share between

TRS and Congress isaround 12%. The

survey says, as perTRS sources, the TRS candi-date will get more than 50%vote share. The Congress

will get around 39% and theBJP will get 4 % to 8% votes.Meanwhile, the survey con-

ducted by Congress party reveals

that its candidate K Janareddy willwin with around 5,000 votes

majority. The TelanganaPradesh CongressCommittee (TPCC) presi-dent and MP N UttamKumar Reddy shared this

with the media here. In the sur-veys conducted by Delhi-based

organisation, and two Telugu elec-tronic channels which are againstTRS, also revealed that TRS candi-date N Bhagat Kumar would win inthe Nagarjuna Sagar bye-election.

Central teams findfaults in Covidmeasures of 3 statesPNS n NEW DELHI

Three Central teams deputed toMaharashtra, Punjab andChhattisgarh earlier this week aftera review of the Covid situation byPrime Minister Narendra Modi,have pointed out multiple flaws inthe handling of the situation by thethree state governments. Overall,the teams had visited 50 districts -30 in Maharashtra, 11 inChhattisgarh and nine in Punjab.Their reviews mentioned a multi-tude of issues ranging from lack ofoptimal use of health care facilities,lack of RT-PCR testing facilities,shortage of healthcare workersand in one place, even attacks onhealthcare workers. In all threestates, there was a marked lack ofcompliance to Covid-appropriatebehaviour, the Central team noted.

Maharashtra reports

over 63,000Covid cases in biggest single-day surge

Delhi reports

over 10,700Covid cases

TS to impose Rs 1,000fine for not wearing masks

PNS n HYDERABAD

Telangana Minister for MunicipalAdministration and UrbanDevelopment K.T. Rama Rao onSunday evening went live with thehastag #AskKTR on Twitter, urg-ing his followers on the socialmedia platform to shoot ques-tions.

Within minutes, #AskKTRhashtag was trending inHyderabad, as questions startedpouring in from netizens in thehope of getting reply from KTR.

Netizens butter up KTR:Ever tried Bollywoodor Hollywood?

Hitherto the facility was

extended to private

teachers, clerks,

accountants, library

staff, lab assistants,

attendants and sweepers

TS reports highestever 3,187 new cases

PNS n HYDERABAD

Telangana State registered itshighest ever 3,187 freshCOVID-19 cases on Saturday,breaching the 3,000-mark,with the new infections push-ing the overall tally to over 3.27lakh. The death toll from coro-navirus rose to 1,759, withseven more fatalities, the stategovernment said on Sunday.

The Greater HyderabadMunicipal Corporation(GHMC) accounted for themost number of cases at 551,followed by MedchalMalkajgiri (333) andRangareddy (271), it said in abulletin, providing details asApril 10 at 8-00 pm. The totalnumber of cases stood at3,27,278; and, with 787 patientsbeing cured, the total recover-ies stood at 3,05,335.The statehas 20,184 active cases.

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hyderabad 02HYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021

Monday MirchiIt's OK to be abroad for 17yrs. Security of a govt job!The Education Department in Telangana

State does not bother Chief Minister KChandrasekhar Rao as long as its own purpos-es are served. It won't flinch from making anillegal reinstatement. As per rules, if anyemployee is removed from services only theChief Minister has the power to reinstate himor her. In 1998 one junior lecturer, who hadbeen selected through then AP Public ServiceCommission, was posted in a college inKarimnagar. But from 2003 she stoppedattending duty. Under rules, if any governmentemployee does not attend duty for more thanone year without permission from properauthorities, the employee would be deemed tohave resigned from his or her post. In suchcases, only the Chief Minister has the powerto reinstate them. However, in the case of thejunior lecturer, after about 17 years, havingstayed in foreign countries, she came back andapproached the Education Department offi-cials. The officials went beyond their call ofduty to be generous to the junior lecturer.Without even sounding the Chief Minister,they chose to reinstate her. In 2011 theEducation Department had removed morethan 50 lecturers for not attending dutywithout taking permission. The junior lectur-er's name figured in that list. Still, since thebabus in question had big hearts, they rein-stated her, setting aside all rules.

Laying sound foundation for building AP

A surprising development in AP's powercircles is the elevation of 1987 batch IAS offi-cer Neerabh Kumar Prasad. Neerabh, seniormost bureaucrat serving as ChiefCommissioner of Land Administration(CCLA -- the most coveted post after ChiefSecretary) in the state, has been given fulladditional charge of the post of MissionDirector, Mission Build Andhra Pradesh. Allthese days, 2006 batch IAS officer PravinKumar has been holding the post. MissionBuild AP was in the news recently due to thelegal tangles it got into, following the decisionto auction most valuable government prop-erties across the state to fund the government'sflagship welfare programmes. Now, the landexpert has to start building.

Lobbying begins amid talkof babudom shake-up

Amid the talk of an impending adminis-trative shake-up in Andhra Pradesh, someIAS officers have begun lobbying for secur-ing plum posts. The grapevine has it thatChief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy hasdecided to transfer at least six district col-lectors, apart from heads of some depart-ments in the Secretariat. He is expected torecast the team upon completion of theongoing process for ZPTC and MPTC elec-tions. Anxious babus are already after

Ministers, IAS officers and other leadersknown to be close to the Chief Minister. Asenior IAS officer conceded that almost allIAS and IPS officers want 'good' position inan 'important' department. Whether the CMcan accommodate all babus by giving themthis rare combination is a million-dollarquestion.

‘Financial crunch' is forpublic consumption

Almost every government department inTS cites its own financial crunch when itcomes to scaling up what it delivers to thepublic. What if it splurges on gadgets, furni-ture etc. for its officials, with least regard forausterity measures, whether mandated or vol-untary? We know about babus going for freshfurniture every time there are transferred evenif their new office has brand new items of fur-niture and furnishings. In Greater HyderabadMunicipal Corporation too, it is customaryfor the corporation to give mobile phones andother gadgets to its commissioners and otherofficers. The tech-savvy ones among theseofficials would settle for nothing short of lat-est iPhone, iPads, Apple MacBook Pro,Samsung Galaxy Notes et al. It doesn't mat-ter (for them) if the gadgets are priced in therange of Rs.50,000 to Rs.90,000. The 'smarter'ones among these officials have managed toget more than one gadget. Barring presentCommissioner Lokesh Kumar and formerGHMC Commissioner Janardhan Reddy,most of the other 30-odd IAS/ IPS officerswho had served as GHMC Commissioners orZonal Commissioners, including DanaKishore, Harichandana, Heads of Planning,Engineering, Vigilance wings, apparently didnot bother to surrender the gadgets given tothem when they moved out on other assign-ments. The GHMC cannot help purchasinggadgets afresh for the new incumbents. Allthis happens when GHMC complains ad nau-seum about its coffers being empty (with audi-tors looking the other way).

Power-hungry babu to keeptabs on performance

One babu's insatiable hunger for powerseems to have triggered a new amendmentto the AIS service rules pertaining to annu-al Performance Appraisal Reports. A sectionof the bureaucrats in AP strongly believe thatit is the brainchild of this bureaucrat whoalready wields immense power in the CMO.This babu, they bemoan, wants to keep theentire administration under his thumb, vir-tually bypassing the Chief Secretary's office.Their point that a busy chief minister willanyhow fall back on select officials in CMOfor a gist of the PARs sounds plausible. Theupshot is that the CMO babu in questionwants a button on everything and everyone,regardless of the negative impact it wouldhave on the image of Jagan, who is otherwiseknown as a 'friendly' CM.

—Yours truly

Considering the prevail-ing geo-political uncer-tainty, coupled with

rapidly spreading secondstrain of corona virus pan-demic, the movements of theprecious metals globally dur-ing the week ended Saturday,has been on the expectedlines. Undoubtedly, the sharemarket is the most vulnerableplace where impact of everyevent, positive or negative, isfelt almost instantaneously.

Consequently, New Yorkgold closed at US $ 1,744.50(per ounce) while silver fol-lowed suit and closed at $25.25 (per ounce). Platinumand palladium closed at $1,195 (per ounce) and $ 2,550(per ounce) respectively.

Other economic parame-

ters remained moderate.Brent closed at US $ 62.95(per barrel) while CrudeMCX oil was quoted atRs.4,432 (per barrel).While Gold MCXstood at Rs.46,610(per 10 gms), MCXSilver closed atRs.66,916 (perkg) andC o p p e rM C Xclosed at Rs.689.90 (per kg).Sensex and Nifty 50 closed at49,591.32 and 14,834.85points.

Leading foreign curren-cies' exchange rates, on theclosing day were: US $:Rs.74.73, British Pound:Rs.102.44, Euro: Rs.88.93,Singapore $: Rs.55.69, Swiss

Franc: Rs.80.84, Australian $:Rs.56.97, Saudi Riyal:Rs.19.93, New Zealand

Dollar: Rs.52.55, KuwaitiDinar: Rs.247.59, Omani

Rial: Rs.194.16, UAEDirham: Rs.20.35,

Japanese Yen:Rs.0.68 and Hong

Kong Dollar :Rs.9.61.

In localmarkets, due

to the traditional marriageseason demand standard gold(24 carats) appreciated con-secutively for the second weekby Rs.770 and closed atRs.47,350 (per 10 gms).Ornamental gold too, fol-lowed the suit and was quot-ed in the range of Rs.43,300- 43,400 on the closing day.

Silver (0.999) also appreciat-ed by Rs.1,900 and closed atRs.71,600 (per kg).

COMMODITIESThe sentiment in the prin-

cipal wholesale commoditymarkets in the twin citiesremained moderate. RythuBazars and the various com-modity markets located inBegum Bazar, Kishangunj,Mukthyargunj, RisalaAbdullah, Mir AlamMandi,Dilsukhnagar, Kukatpally,Bowenpally and GeneralBazar recorded moderatetrading.

During the week, commonpulses such as tuar dal,masoor dal, moong dal andurad dal and commoditieslike chillies and garlic record-ed a marginal decline or

remained unchanged at theirrespective last week's closinglevels, while staple food grainsand common edible oils,turmeric, garlic and gingerrecorded a small appreciation.

Common vegetables suchas cabbage, caulif lower,ribbed gourd, snake gourd,lady's finger, cucumber, pota-toes, onions, tomatoes,French and leafy vegetablesremained unchanged at theirrespective levels in the lastweek.

The NECC wholesale priceof egg in Hyderabad appre-ciated by Rs.58 and closed atRs.409 (per 100). The high-est price of Rs.475 wasrecorded at Kolkata, whileLudhiana recorded the low-est of Rs.392.

WEEKLY MARKET REVIEW

Share markets become highly vulnerable

HC UPADHYAY

Much to the relief of all nation-alist forces within the country,the Supreme Court once againupheld that illegal migrantsfrom Myanmar were neithercitizens of India nor therefugees; and therefore, can bedeported back to Myanmaralbeit after following the dueprocess of law. The much-awaited judgment onRohingyas' deportation wasdelivered by on April 8 by athree-Judge bench comprisingChief Justice of India S.ABobde, Justice A.S Bopannaand Justice V.Ramasubramanian in a casetitled, Mohammad Salimullahand another Vs. Union of Indiaand Others.

The case filed after sup-pressing the factum of dis-missal of a case filed earlier inI.A No. 142725 of 2018 for sim-ilar relief in respect of illegalmigrants detained in Assam,had caught nation-wide atten-

tion because its outcome wasbound to affect the interests ofevery Indian citizen.

The high-profile casewas dismissed by the apexcourt with the followingobservations:

"It is also true that therights guaranteedunder Articles 14and 21 are availableto all persons whomay or may not becitizens. But theright not to bedeported, is ancillaryor concomitant tothe right to reside in any partof the territory of India guar-anteed under Article 19(1)(e)."

The Court also noted thatIndia was not a party to theRefugee Convention.

The Judgment has reinforcedthe government's stand thatIndia cannot be allowed tobecome the capital of illegalmigrants from all over theworld. According to theinformed sources, there are

more than five crore or about4 per cent of India's population

as illegal migrants. Overthe past several years, suchillegal migrants have beenpouring into the country,

mostly from the bor-ders ofBangladesh,Myanmar and

Pakistan. Some anti-national and fanatical

elements extend neces-sary support to such ille-gal migrants by providingshelter, food, clothing ,employment and Indian

citizenship by creating fakeIDs. Obviously, these 'Astin kesaap' within our countryindulge in harbouring of illegalmigrants not just for the sakeof money, but to build up theirpolitical vote banks.

Now that the legal hurdlesare all over, it is high time thegovernment deported not onlyRohingyas but other illegalimmigrants also lock, stockand barrel without losing a sin-

gle moment. But before doingso, the government would dowell to put behind the bars allthe friends, well-wishers andpolitical personalities, irrespec-tive of their stature who, areresponsible for the infiltrationand settlement of such illegalmigrants. Though this is amajor task, it can be fulfilledwith the political will of theelected nationalist representa-tives, government machinery,and above all, goodwill of peo-ple.

In fact, the time has comenow to call a spade a spade.With the Supreme Court'sgreen light, the nation-widecrack down on illegal migrantsand their ' Mai-Baap' within thecountry, including jihadi andextremist groups and support-ing political parties should bedealt with an iron hand. If thisis not done now, the problemwill aggravate beyond manage-able limits in near future.Thereafter, whatever happens,only the government of present

dispensation will be heldresponsible. Arnab gets relief on technical grounds Republic TV's Editor-in-ChiefArnab Goswami, his wifeSamyabrata Ray Goswami andM/s. ARG Outlier MediaPvt.Ltd, got reprieve from aSessions Court when a com-plaint filed by the DeputyCommissioner of Police ofMumbai, Abhishek Trimukh,against them was dismissed asnot maintainable on technicalgrounds.

The said complaint was filedby the DCP in his personalname under Section 199 (2) ofthe CrPC against some state-ments made by Arnab withregard to the role of the saidDCP in course of investigationinto the death of the actorSushant Singh Rajput.

Explaining the technical flawin the complaint, the JudgeUday M. Padwad said: " Section199(2) of the Cr.P.C requiresthat the complaint has to be in

writing and has to be made bythe public prosecutor. This, inother words, means that noother person against whomthe offence is alleged to havebeen committed, can makesuch a complaint. "Adverting tothe status of the aggrievedparty, the Court said that he willbe only a witness in the case.

The Court observed that inthe instant case, the complaintwas not made by the publicprosecutor but was made by theDCP while the public prosecu-tor had just put his signature asis the practice while preferringan appeal or revision. Unfit as Minister:Karnataka on Lok AyuktaA bench of Karnataka LokAyukta, Justice Cyriac Joseph (former Supreme Court judge)and Harun-al-Rashid (formerHigh Court judge) has heldthat K.T Jaleel, Minister forHigher Education andMinority Welfare, is guilty ofnepotism, abuse of power, andfavouritism and that he has vio-

lated the oath of office. Jaleel, took a decision as theMinister to change the qualifi-cations for the post of GeneralManager in the Kerala StateMinorities DevelopmentFinance Corporation byadding, "B.Tech with PGDBA"as a necessary qualification tomake his cousin KT Adeeb eli-gible for the post. The declaration made underSection 12(3) of the Kerala LokAyukta Act now has to beaccepted by the Chief Ministerunder Section 14 of the saidAct. On acceptance by theChief Minister, the Minister hasto resign from the office as perSection 14(2)(i) of the Act. Bombay HC decries VIPculture The Bombay High Court camedown heavily on some politicalleaders in Maharashtra whowere getting vaccinated againstCovid-19 virus at homes."When even the President andthe Prime Minister of the coun-try were going to the designat-

ed centres for vaccination, howsome political leaders could getvaccinated at their homes",asked the Court, and addedthat it sends out a wrong mes-sage. These observations came fromthe bench in the course of hear-ing of a PIL plea filed by advo-cates Dhruti Kapadia andKunal Tiwari seeking a direc-tion to the Centre and theMaharashtra government toprovide door-to-door vacci-nation facility for senior citi-zens above the age of 75 , bed-ridden persons and specially-abled persons. 16 States defer NationalLok Adalats Due to the sudden rise in thenumber of Covid-19 cases in thecountry, 16 State Legal ServicesAuthorities have decided topostpone the scheduledNational Lok Adalats to futuredates. Accordingly, in Andhra Pradeshthe National Lok Adalat will beorganized on May 8, it is learnt.

LEGAL

ROUNDUP

Go Rohingyas, Go: SC flags green light for deportation!

Continued from page 1

Betting organisers appointtheir agents in importantcities like Hyderabad,Vijayawada, Visakhapatnamand Delhi, among others.They are in regular touch withthe punters. Punters are busymining websites for materialto place reviews of teams' per-formances every day. Some ofthese websites are givingranks to teams, depending ontheir past performance.

One website, while givingtips to fresh punters on howto bet for IPL matches, says:"If you don't know how to beton IPL, we have you covered.We have done a full-fledgedcomparison of the best IPL to

help you decide where toplace your best cricket bets".

The betting organisationsoperate from star hotels,apartments, gated communi-ties and from individual res-idences. They take all "precau-tions" to avoid problems fromthe police and other depart-ments over their activity.

One person with deepknowledge of the goings-onsaid: "The betting organisersoperate their activities fromunknown places, for examplethe betting activities inHyderabad operate from Goa.He said some sites operatefrom Dubai. The betting ratesare decided at Mumbai andaccording to that the agents inother cities collect amounts.

Continued from page 1

While sharing old picturesof KTR, one of the usersposed an interesting ques-tion as to whether theMinister had ever tried get-ting into Bollywood andHollywood movies, consid-ering that he "looks like ahero". KTR replied,"Bollywood and Hollywood.Maree pedda chettuekkistunnav ??(You are flat-tering me)".

Another user asked, "Ifany chances to postponeclass 10th and Intermediateexams" (sic). The IT minis-ter replied, "You have to askstate Education MinisterSabita Indira Reddy".

One of the users evenasked about the TelanganaFiber Grid. The user asked,"When will be it completedcompletely. Does this pro-ject really benefit 23 millionpeople in the state? (sic)"KTR replied, "Initially all12,751 villages will be cov-ered by August this year. Allurban areas are also nowbeing taken up".

Another netizen askedabout the status of PharmaCity. The user tweeted,"What's the status ofHyderabad Pharma city? Iunderstand pandemicshowed it's impact on it.KTR replied, "Land acqui-sition is almost complete.We should start allotment oflands to investors soon".

PNS n ADILABAD

Loss due to fire mishaps isvery high in undividedAdilabad district as there areonly 13 fire stations for a pop-ulation of 28 lakh in the dis-trict. There are at least 6,49,849houses in the district’s 70 oddmandals.

In fact, there are only fourfire stations in the district.But the surrounding Nirmaldistrict has three, Mancherialhas four and Kumrambhim hastwo stations.

To douse flames in Boathmandal’s Marpelli region, firetenders have to be rushedthere from Ichchoda, which is40 km away. It takes at least onehour for the fire tenders toreach the place.

If fire mishap takes place inBela mandal, which is 35 km

away from Adilabad, fire ten-ders need at least 40 minutes toreach there. If a fire mishaptakes place at Bejjuru in SirpurKagaznagar constituency, peo-ple would have to lose their

hopes.In Mancherial district,

Nennela, Kasipet mandals arejust 20-25 km away fromBellampalli. Generally haystacks catch fire in the area. Fire

tenders take at least one-and-a-half-hour to reach there.

The fire station is located infour rooms in Adilabad.Proposals have been sent forconstruction of fire stations at

a cost of Rs 1.80 crore last year.But they are not yet cleared.

In Chennur, the fire stationis located in an ad hoc struc-ture. In fact, the fire station isbeing run from a guest house.The fire brigade personnel ofthe station have been facingmany difficulties because oflack of permanent station.

The fire station at Khanapuris being run from farmers resthouse in the market yard there.The fire station has beenunderstaffed. All the personnelworking there have been post-ed there on deputation basis.There is no assured water facil-ity there.

In Boath mandal, fire stationhas been sanctioned, site hasbeen acquired. So far, fire ten-ders are not allotted. Funds forbuilding the fire station are yetto be released.

Adilabad faces shortage of fire stations

PNS n HYDERABAD

The left parties have decided toextend their support to the rul-ing TRS in ongoing NagarjunaSagar by-elections. Followingthe decisions of national par-ties - CPI and CPM, the statecommitties have announcedthat they will extend their sup-port to the TRS. The nationalcommitties of CPI and CPMdecided to not to support toCongress and BJP, it is learnt.It may be recalled here that theCongress sought the support ofCPI and CPM for the elections.

Continued from page 1

The authorities set April 15as the last date for them toapply. If there is no name inthe attendance register, theseekers of benefit under thisscheme should produce bankaccount statement.

With regard to caseswhere they are working inschools, but the school man-agements has not registeredtheir names in the register,the education departmenthas sought constitution of acomplaints department ineach district.

Punters get goingas IPL season...

TS doctors to Govt: Suspend surgeriesContinued from page 1

Patients are reportedly turningpositive after elective surgeriesdue to which doctors aredemanding that elective surg-eries be kept on hold for thenext two months, particularlywith regard to senior citizensand others with comorbidities.

Dr K Mahesh, President-Health Care Reforms DoctorsAssociation (HRDA) said, "Asthere is possibility and wealready heard what happenedin few cases that patients are

turning positive after surgeryit's better to stop electives fortime being keeping in view ofrapidly progressing secondwave. As even Health CareWorkers(HCWs) may getinfected due to normal visit tothese patients. Its better to usethe HCWs to treat explosiveCOVID19 cases and emergen-cies only".

Dr G Srinivas, SeniorResident Doctor at OsmaniGeneral Hospital, said, "There'sa need to stop elective surgeriesfor next two months at least in

COVID19 hospitals inTelangana state. Already pre-miere institutions gave ordersto stop the elective surgeries; sothere's a need to stop electivesurgeries even in TelanganaState".

Dr Ravi Shankar, spokesper-son- Telangana Unit of IndianMedical Association (IMA),said, "Electives need to be post-poned for some time in theinterests of patients and med-ical staff as well, as there is surgein the Covid cases. Covid surgeis expected to reach its peak up

to June and will declined afterthat as per the experts".

Dr Sanjeev Yadav, VicePresident- Indian MedicalAssociation Telangana said,"All patients must have RT-PCR tests and if in doubt chestscan should be done beforesurgery as it helps the staff ofOT, Post OP and others toknow the status to keep safetymeasures. All possible elec-tives can be postponed if foundpositive and rescheduled forsafe period both for hospitaland patient safety.

Netizens butterup KTR: Ever...

Govt to provide...Continued from page 1

In Maharashtra -- whichalone accounts for 48.57 percent of the total active case-load of the country -- con-tainment operations werefound to be sub-optimal inseveral districts. The testingcapacity in several districts inthe state is overwhelmed,resulting in delay in report-ing of test results.

Surveillance and contacttracing were found to beminimum in Buldhana,Satara, Aurgangabad andNanded, mostly due to lim-ited manpower.

Central teams...

TRS, Congress busy with surveys...Continued from page 1

The Vigilance Departmentalso in its report to govern-ment said the TRS victory inthe Nagarjuna Sagar bye-elec-tion is certain. Majority of thesurveys indicate victory ofTRS.

The key players TRS andCongress have taken the bye-election as prestige issue andit has become a battle groundbetween these two parties.

Both parties have roped inthousands of their supportersfor election campaigns at thegrassroot level.

According to tentative pro-gramme, on 14th April ChiefMinister K ChandrasekharRao is likely to address a pub-lic meeting in support of partycandidate N Bhagat Kumar.TPCC president N UttamKumar Reddy has alreadyaddressed public meetings inthe constituency.

Left parties to support TRS

PNS n HYDERABAD

The Hyderabad MetropolitanDevelopment Authority(HMDA) has been initiatingmeasures to arrest the stinkemanating from the HussainSagar Lake by adopting mod-ern methods, including thebio-remediation technique.

The HMDA authorities, whowoke up rather early, are goingto involve several reputablenational and internationalagencies to bring the stinkfrom the lake under control.

They have been holdingnegotiations with the PollutionControl Board andEnvironmental Protection,Training and ResearchOrganisation officials for thepurpose. They will invite glob-al bids for the purpose andutilise services of internation-al consultants to prevent thestink from the lake. Duringsummer, the Hussain SagarLake emits rotten egg smell ina radius of one kilometrearound the lake. The unbear-able smell poses problems to

the tourists. Anaerobic bacteria grows

in the polluted waters of thelake reducing the availabili-ty of bio-oxygen demand(BOD). According to stan-dard rules, the extent of BODin a litre of polluted watershould be 6 to 7 mg.However, the BOD in thewaters of the lake has comedown to 4 to 5 mg per litre.Because of summer heat,water level reduces in thelake, further reducing theavailability of oxygen.

The anaerobic bacteriaproduction in the lake goesdown further. The PollutionControl Board scientists saidthat the bacteria multiples inlakhs in several hours. Thebacteria thrives on the sul-phate molecules present inpolluted waters and releaseshydrogen sulphide gas, whichsmells like rotten eggs

With the help of the bac-teria, the HMDA authoritieshave been taking steps toarrest the stinking smell usingbio-remediation methods.

HYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021hyderabad 03

The Department of Horticulture isoffering a training programmefor the urban youth, both male

and female, residing in locationsunder the limits of HyderabadMetropolitan Development Authority(HMDA). According to a pressrelease, the candidates should haveminimum education qualifications orbe able to read and write, and aged between 18 years and 25 years.The training will be provided in the field of urban horticulture for 15days and will include imparting skilled techniques such aslandscape works, cultivation of kitchen garden etc. The training tobe offered in the last week of April at Telangana Horticulture TrainingInstitute, Red Hills, Nampally, the press release said. The course isfree and for application forms and other details, interestedcandidates can contact the office of Deputy Director, GovernmentGardens, Horticulture department, inside Public Gardens (Ph.7997724934 / 8125304636).

Dept of Horticulture offers atraining for Hyd youngsters

CITY LIGHTS

With a zeal to help the differently-abled people, a Hyderabad baseddoctor helps the poor and needy

disabled people to give them a secondlife, through his 'Disabled FoundationTrust'.Inspired by the work of FormerPresident of India late APJ Abdul Kalam,this Hyderabad based doctor providesfree treatment to the needy differently-abled people. He helps the differently-abled people right from treatment, medication and further to find ajob. Dr Vijay Bhaskar, a Hyderabad based professional orthopaedicsurgeon, has been serving the differently-abled people since 1997who are in need of treatment, by providing them free treatment andmedication under 'Disabled Foundation Trust'. "While I was workingat Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS) in Hyderabad, the lateAPJ Abdul Kalam once visited the NIMS and from his words to helpthe needy and differently-abled people. I have drawn my inspirationfrom him and started working for differently-abled people. DrKalamenlightened us with the problems that differently-abled people faceand explained about the fabrication of artificial limbs," he said.Sincethe inception of the foundation, DrBhaskar has been able to conductover 7.5 lakh disability screening camps in various districts.

Srujana Cultural and Literary Organisation honored the CEO ofThe Third Empire Media and Analytics Sunil Dhavala withExcellency Award at Sri ThyagarayaGana Sabha in Chikkadpally

as part of its annual Life Time Achievement and Excellency Awards.The award was presented by Justice of High Court ofTelanganaSridevi and others. There were also two categories ofawards - Lifetime Achievement Award and Excellency awards. TVproducer Sithadevi received the Life Time Achievement Award, whilethe others who received the Excellency Awards include Ramadevi, TVenkataratnam, Narmada, Vanajakshi, DrVasumathi, Manjulanaidu,DhanaLaxmi, J Anuradha. While some prominent persons includingGokarajuRanga Raju, GVK Reddy, GN Rao, Krishna and SonuSoodothers were also elected for the award.

Media Entrepreneur Sunil Dhavalahonoured with Excellency Award

PNS n HYDERABAD

There were days when reach-ing Durgam Cheruvu fromthe Banjara Hills side was atedious drive. Not anymore.The Strategic RoadDevelopment Programme(SRDP) of the State govern-ment has changed the waypeople in the city commute.

The strategic road develop-ment programme (SRDP)implemented in Hyderabad ata cost of Rs 1,010 crore hasbeen saving precious time andfuel of the people and ensuringsmooth travel to various desti-nations across the city withouthaving to endure traffic snarlsat important cross-sections.

Apart from facilitatingsmooth flow of traffic, thesestructures have triggered majormetamorphosis in the respec-tive areas. The SRDP - the Stategovernment's long-term ini-tiative for easing traffic con-gestion in different areas of thecity, is already yielding results.

"I have been travelling onthis road for over two years,and I never thought that Icould reach BiodiversityJunction from Jubilee Hills in10 minutes.

Earlier, traffic snarls werefrequent. Not anymore," says

Mohammed Younus, now aregular user of the flyoverfrom Jubilee Hills Road No 45.

Underpasses and flyoverswere constructed in differentareas of the city and theGHMC is ensuring there is nodearth of funds and that theworks are being executed as perschedule.

As part of the SRDP, 20 pro-jects have been conceived likeconstruction of Road overBridges (RoB) and Road underBridges (RuB). Out of them, 18

have been successfully execut-ed and brought to use.

The chronic and most com-plex traffic problem has beenresolved. Widening of narrowroads under road underbridges and construction ofRoBs and RuBs made themovement of traffic on cityroads smoother.

Earlier, the people used tohave a harrowing experiencewaiting a maze of traffic signalslosing one's patience. Evenambulances have no option to

wait at the signals. Therefore,the government of Telanganatook measures on a war-foot-ing to end such harrowingexperiences by making the citysignal-free city and global city.

With several more projectsunder progress, MunicipalAdministration and UrbanDevelopment Minister KTRama Rao has been directingthe officials of GreaterHyderabad MunicipalCorporation (GHMC) to expe-dite the SRDP projects. The

Minister wanted the officialsand agencies to execute differ-ent works simultaneously at thesites to ensure early completionof the projects.

Officials have been instruct-ed to ensure that the works aretaken up in coordination withthe departments concerned,including shifting of utilities,and to avoid delays and slowpace of land acquisition.

The progress of the SRDPprojects is being closely fol-lowed by the State government.

The projects executed aspart of the SRDP include Hi-tec City-MMTS Road underBridge, Ayyappa SocietyJunction underpass,Mindspace junction fly-over,Chintalakunta check-postunderpass, Kamineni Junctionfly-over, LB Nagar fly-over,Rajiv Gandhi statue fly-over,Bio-Diversity Grade-I separa-tor, Bio-Diversity Grade-2 sep-arator, LB Nagar underpass,Kamineni right side flyover,Punjagutta steel bridge nearChutneys, Uppuguda Roadunder Bridge, Byramalgudaright side fly-over, DurgamCheruvu four-lane elevatedcorridor, Durgam Cheruvucable bridge, Lalapet RUBrestoration and Uttam NagarRoad under Bridge.

SRDP set to end to traffic woesPNS n HYDERABAD

Though the outbreak of Covidhas had a telling effect on allsectors, pushing the economyto the brink, it seems as if theTelangana State RoadTransport Corporation(TSRTC) has managed tosomehow stand on its feet,thanks to the cargo services ithas launched. According tosources, the parcel and cargoservices have been receivinggood response from the peo-ple all over Telangana, eversince its commencement.

With the launching of newservice, the RTC became clos-er to the people. It has beenforging ahead with the resolveto provide better services topeople.

In fact, the RTC delivers anygoods in 12 hours to any partof the state.

The state government haspermitted the RTC to launchcourier, parcel and cargo ser-vice to wriggle the RTC out ofthe red. During the lockdownperiod last year, the service waslaunched.

A higher official in the

TSRTC said that parcels fromother states like AndhraPradesh and Karnataka arereaching here in 24 hours.

The private transportersused to take 4-5 days to trans-port anything from one placeto another. The private trans-porters used to wait for days tilladequate number of businessis generated to transport thegoods to the destination. Butthe RTC waits for none andtransports the goods to the

destination immediately. As per the directions of

Chief Minister KChandrashekhar Rao to devisestrategies on expanding parcel,courier and cargo services,RTC has been working onimproving these services. Itwould also be expanding ser-vices in parcel booking by con-tacting government depart-ments, non-governmentalorganisations and private com-panies.

Desiltation works in drains underway inKukatpally zone. Efforts are afoot by the GreaterHyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) tocomplete the naladesilting works by May end.

The works are being taken up at a cost of Rs 45cr covering a total of 870 kms. According to

officials, the GHMC is focusing on the desiltingof nalas to avert the inundation during themonsoon season. The desilting works if

completed prior to the monsoon would ensurefree flow of the waters in these storm waterdrains. GHMC has picked up 356 nalas and

drains for desilting in all of the Zones.

PLANS AFOOT

TSRTC cargo service winsappreciation from citizens

PNS n HYDERABAD

Nishanth, an eight-year-oldboy, came into contact withan electrical transformer atEast Maruti Nagar, ASRao Nagar and suf-fered seriousinjuries earlierthis week. He isreportedly in acritical situa-tion, admittedin a privatehospital in thecity.

According to avideo that has beendoing rounds on socialmedia, the child's mother,Dharavath Janaki, is seenappealing for financial help tocover the treatment costs.

The video shows a teary-eyed Janaki, a single mother,

giving details of howNishanth was playing outsidetheir house and got in phys-ical contact with a trans-former.

When an activistfrom the city tweet-

ed a screen-grabof the boy in theh o s p i t a l ,requesting theIT Minister KTRama Rao forhelp, he imme-

diately respond-ed on the

microblogging plat-form.

Instructing his office toassist with the situation,Rama Rao tagged his office'stwitter handle @KTROfficeand tweeted saying "Will takecare of Nishanth @KTRofficeplease contact and assist."

KTR helps for treatment of 8-yr-old electrocuted

HMDA initiates measures to checkstinking smell from Hussain Sagar

ANUSHA PUPPALAn HYDERABAD

Telangana Gig and PlatformWorkers Union, IFAT demand-ed to prioritise free vaccinationfor app-based transport work-ers and staffers at petrol bunks.

The Association stated thatthese frontline warriors playeda vital and unappreciated roleduring the Covid pandemic asthey provided all necessitieslike food, water, gas, petrol,diesel and others to each andevery corner of the nationwithout any delay while risk-ing their lives.

Taxi drivers and other app-based workers in the cargo,food delivery and passengertransportation sector are alsofrontline warriors as they pro-vided their services even dur-ing lockdown amidCovidpandemic. Despite theindispensable role that com-mercial drivers play in dis-tributing vaccines, they havenot been recommended forvaccine allocation on priority,alleged the Telangana TaxiAssociations.

The Taxi Associations andIFAT has appealed the gov-ernment to include the taxidriver, passenger transportoperators and other workers inthe transportation space in thepriority list and ensure they getvaccinated early.

ShaikSalauddin, founderand state president ofTelangana Gig and PlatformWorkers Union said, "Roadtransport sector is one of thecritical sectors of the economyis supposedly the backbone ofthe economy as it providesessential services to the com-mon man 365 days.The strate-gic importance of the roadtransport sector cannot beunder-estimated, which wasamply demonstrated duringCovid-induced lockdowns.While maintaining the conti-nuity of the supply chain ofessential commodities andensuring that communitieshave access to food, medicalcare and other essential com-modities, this sector providedservices to police, doctors,paramedics and other recog-nised frontline workers."

‘Prioritise app-based workers for free vax’

PNS n HYDERABAD

The president of HyderabadCricket Association (HCA)Mohammed Azharuddin haswarned of a show-causenotice to its board membersif they create ruckus in theAnnual General Meeting(AGM) intentionally.

Warning that necessaryaction would be taken againstthe board members,Azharuddin said that Boardof Control for Cricket inIndia (BCCI) is serious on theissues taking place in HCA.

Speaking to the media aftergeneral body meeting held atUppal Stadium on Sunday,the HCA president said thathis aim is to develop the gameof cricket in the state. TheHCA has allocated 20 percentfunds for the development ofcricket in districts, heinformed stating that theassociation will developcricket stadiums in all the dis-tricts similar to Pondicherryand Andhra Pradesh states.

HCA will develop stadiums in distswith 20% funds, says Azharuddin

Hyd-based doctor helps differently-abled people

PNS n HYDERABAD

A man allegedly killed hiswife and mother-in-law hereat Gandhinagar of IDABollaram on Sunday. The accused is said to haveattacked his wife and moth-er-in-law with a sickle killingthem on the spot. The cause behind his actionis yet to be known by thepolice, said Circle InspectorG Prashanth. However, itwas alleged that the accusedsuspected his wife of infi-delity which ensued to theincident. The police said thatthe accused, Narasimha, anelectrician was residing withhis wife and mother-in-law inGandhinagar.

Man kills wife, mother-in-law

Continued from page 1

The Centre announced a banon export of Remdesivir, usedin coronavirus treatment andits Active PharmaceuticalIngredients, and asked alldomestic manufacturers to dis-play on their website details oftheir stockists and distributors.

There were some reports ofshortage of drugs from a fewstates.

India's COVID-19 tally ofcases climbed to 1,33,58,805,and the death toll increased to1,69,275 with 839 daily newfatalities, the highest sinceOctober 18, 2020, the dataupdated by Health Ministry onSunday morning showed.

While the cumulative num-ber of COVID-19 vaccine

doses administered in thecountry has crossed 10 croreafter 85 days, the 'Tika Utsav'or a special 'vaccination festi-val' was started till April 14.

"Anyone eligible for the vac-cine should get the jab, and forthis the society and adminis-tration have to make fullefforts," Prime Minister Modisaid pitching for "zero vaccinewaste" and urging the people tofollow COVID-appropriatebehaviour.

"This festival is, in a way, thebeginning of another majorwar against corona. We have tolay special emphasis on per-sonal hygiene as well as socialhygiene," he said.

Five states -- Maharashtra,Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, UttarPradesh and Kerala -- cumu-

latively account for 70.82 per-cent of India's active COVID-19 cases, while Maharashtraalone accounts for 48.57 per-cent, the Union HealthMinistry said.

Besides these states, Delhi,Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh,Gujarat, Haryana, Rajasthan,Punjab, Telangana,Uttarakhand, Andhra Pradeshand West Bengal are displayingan upward graph in daily newcases.

Most of these states havereimposed restrictions, includ-ing the closure of schools,night curfew, weekend andlocal shutdowns, while rulingout a total lockdown, but as thelatest wave of patients contin-ues to flood hospitals, there aresome signs of a rethink.

Maharashtra Chief MinisterUddhav Thackeray and hisDelhi counterpart ArvindKejriwal have said that a lock-down will be the only optionif the infections don't abate andthe health system shows signsof collapsing.

Kejriwal on Sunday said theCOVID-19 situation in thenational capital is "very seri-ous".

The city recorded 10,774fresh COVID-19 cases onSunday, the highest single-dayspike so far, with 48 more fatal-ities.

The fourth wave is moredangerous than the previouswave, he told a press confer-ence, and urged the people notto step out unless there isurgent work.

Continued from page 1

Over 1.15 lakh samples weretested on Saturday.Cumulatively, over 1.09 croresamples have been tested tilldate. The samples tested permillion population was over2.95 lakh, the bulletin said.

The case fatality rate in thestate was 0.54 per cent, whileit was 1.3 per cent at thenational level. The recoveryrate in Telangana was 93.29per cent, while it was 90.4 percent in the country.

Over 17.61 lakh people inthe state have received theirfirst dose of COVID-19 vac-cine.

Continued from page 1

Seven Indian companies areproducing the injection undervoluntary licensing agreementwith M/s. Gilead Sciences,USA. They have an installedcapacity of about 38.80 lakhunits per month, the ministrysaid. "In light of the above,Government of India has pro-hibited the exports of remde-sivir injection and remdesivirActive PharmaceuticalIngredients (API) till the sit-uation improves," it said.

The Department ofPharmaceuticals has been incontact with the domesticmanufacturers to ramp up the

drug's production, it added.Government of India has

also advised states that theextant 'National ClinicalManagement Protocol forCOVID-19', which is based onevidence, has been developedafter many interactions bycommittee of experts and it isthe guiding document fortreatment of COVID-19patients.

In the protocol, remdesiviris listed as an investigationaltherapy, i.e. where informedand shared decision making isessential, besides taking noteof contra indications men-tioned in the detailed guide-lines, the ministry said.

PM says ‘Tika Utsav' another major war TS reportshighest ever3,187 cases

Government prohibitsexports of Remdesivir

hyderabad 04HYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021

Minister for Finance T Harish Rao, MLC Sheri Subash Reddy, MLAMadhusudhan Reddy and others taking part in Rathostavam organised as part ofongoing Brahmotsavams of Nacharam Lakshmi Narsimha Swamy in Medak onSunday

PNS n SIDDIPET

Recalling the services of socialreformer and humanistMahathma Jyothirao Phule,Minister for Finance T HarishRao heaped praises on him forstriving for the betterment ofdowntrodden and weaker sec-tions after paying tributes tohim by garlanding his statue atthe Old Bus Stand here onSunday.

Taking part in the 195th birthanniversary celebrations ofPhule at the Old Bus Stand here,the Minister for Finance laudedthe services of Phule and termedhim as a great man, who foughtagainst child marriage.

He was a great pragmatist,who first educated his wifeSavitribai, believing thatinequalities would be eliminat-ed if women were educated.His contribution to the com-munity reconstruction wasmemorable, he recalled andsaid the government was pro-viding quality education tostudents from weaker sectionsin line with his aspirations.

He said that many develop-ment and welfare schemes arebeing implemented for theweaker sections. He said thereal tribute to Phule was pro-viding more opportunities forunderprivileged and weakersections to see their develop-ment in education and employ-ment. MLC RaghothamaReddy, municipal chairmanRajanarsu, public representa-tives and others were present.

Harish recalls Phule’sservices to society

Harish Rao paying tributes to Phule bygarlanding his statue to mark his 195th

birth anniversary in Siddipet onSunday

PNS n HYDERABAD

Chief Minister KChandrasekhar Rao shouldincrease the upper age limit ofyouth by 10 years to enablethem to apply for all the jobrecruitment notifications issuedin Telangana, demanded AICCNational Spokesperson SravanDasoju.

According to the Congressleader, the upper age limitshould be fixed at 44 years, asdone in the past, from the exist-ing 34 years that is eliminatingmillions of beleaguered unem-ployed and qualified Telanganayouth from applying for newjobs in the state.

He dashed out a letter to theChief Minister in which heurged to consider the risingunemployment in Telangana asa social emergency andappealed to him to constitutea special Task Force to addressthe sensitive issue with top pri-ority to make sure youth areprotected from the desperateand frustrated conditions.

While setting aside politics,Sravan requested an all-partymeeting to discuss the unem-ployment issue to find out away forward to provide themadequate job opportunities inthe public and private sectors.

“As you may be aware thatthe recent job notification No.3/2021 issued on March 31,2021 by TSPSC has reduced thecandidates’ upper age limit to34 years, thereby eliminatinglakhs of unemployed youth,who have aggressively partici-pated in the Telangana move-ment since 2009. The unem-ployment problem inTelangana and also the prevail-ing conditions of the pandem-ic Covid-19 outbreak crippled

the normal life, including theunemployed youth. In thiscontext, where most of themare still eagerly waiting fortheir turn for a government joband to have better livelihood,reducing the upper age limit to34 years is a shock to them”, heexplained.

He pointed out that the gov-ernment of Telangana hadrelaxed the upper age ceiling by10 years through various GOspreviously between 2015 and2017 with which the candi-dates’ eligibility has gone upfrom 34 years to 44 years andthat rational act certainly ben-efited some candidates in thepast. But, due to lack of recruit-ments in the last seven years,the youth got frustrated and leftwithout any option other thanto wait for a fresh notification.

Sravan demandsincrease in age limitfor government jobs

PNS n MULUGU

Taking up cudgels against TRSMLA from BhupalapallyAssembly constituency GandraVenkataramana Reddy, CongressMLA from Mulugu Seethakkafound fault with him for violatingthe protocol by not inviting her tothe programme organised in herconstituency. Speaking to themedia here on Sunday, she point-ed out that without giving infor-mation to her, Bhupalapally MLAhad released water from theRamappa lake feeder channel onSaturday.

She alleged that the TRS MLA

did not inform her about the trialrun of feeder channel fromRamappa lake to MuluguGhanpur tank and Vangapallitank in Ghanpur mandal ofBhupalpally district.

Bhupalpally MLA GandraVenkataramana Reddy on

Saturday reached feeder channel,along with his party workers, andreleased water from the feederchannel saying it is a trial run.

After learning about it,Congress leaders from Muluguand Venkatapur mandals rushedto the spot had a heated argument

with Gandra and demanded thathe should not release the waterwithout the presence of the localMLA Seethakka. But, the TRSMLA went ahead and directed theBhupalpally irrigation EE torelease the water. She alleged thatthe TRS government has beenignoring the protocols ever it cameto power.

Sithakka said that she wouldreport the issue to the authoritiesconcerned and submit a petitionagainst the Irrigation departmentengineers. DCC president KumarSwami, Kisan Morcha districtpresident Rajendra Goud andothers were present.

Seethakka takes up cudgels against Gandra

Congress MLA G Seethakka addressing the media in Mulugu on Sunday

P VENKATESHWARLU

n SIDDIPET

This is a school with a differ-ence as even elders, too, canattend it, along with theirwards. Are you puzzled hoecome parents and kids canattend the same school? But, itis true, ‘Swachhbadi’ waslaunched in Siddipet here onSaturday.

'Swachhbadi' will teachlessons on waste managementrather than curriculum. "This‘badi’ will tells us how danger-ous garbage can be if it is notdisposed of properly. We havestarted the first of its kindschool in south India here," saidMinister for Finance T HarishRao.

He said that this clean schoolwas set up to keep the urbanpeople healthy and happy.

"Thank you to Dr Shanthi,leaders, activists and the peopleof Siddipet for giving a newimpetus to Siddipet," theMinister stated. He was happyto start this school as it is dif-ferent from other schools.

"Over 40 tonnes of garbagewas being generated in Siddipet

municipality per day." However,he said the municipality hadcome up with a good idea as thepiling up of garbage wouldharm the health of the urbanpeople. Compost yards can beset up in the municipality wardsto sort out the garbage intothree types and use the garbage

in many ways.Underscoring the need for

good health, the Minister said,“We must give our childrengood health, but not an illness.”

"We must protect our townand our home. If the gully is notclean, good air and good foodcannot be provided," he said.

"We will provide training toschoolchildren, Dwcra womenhere. We will conduct digitalclasses and a PowerPoint pre-sentation was conducted onthe occasion.”

He called upon the denizensto grow vegetables on theirrooftops with compost fertiliz-ers as they are good for health.

He opined that people facingmany health problems due toexcessive use of chemicals andfertilizers.

The minister called uponthe people of the town to attendthe school to learn how to turngarbage into fertilizer.

The taste of vegetables isgone due to the overuse of fer-ti l izers. MunicipalCommissioner Ramanachari,chairman Rajanarsu, publicrepresentatives, officials andothers were present.

‘Swachhbadi’: School with a difference

A volunteer explaining to the Minister on how to protect the environment (Right) Minister for Finance T Harish Rao taking aselfie on the ‘Swachhbadi’ premises after the launch in Siddipet on Sunday

Cheat arrestedPNS n PATANCHERU

A fraudster,who lan-guished inprison forsome time,yet againwent to jailwhen he didnot stopdeceivingthe peoplein the name

of providing jobs and opportu-nities in films.

The incident took place in theRamachandrapuram police sta-tion limits. According toRamachandrapuram CIJagadish, the accused was iden-tified as Konduru Rajesh ofAnantapur district. He had col-lected Rs 5.5 lakh in installmentsfor providing a job to oneTejaswini of Kandukur inPrakasam district in BHEL.Whenever he was asked aboutthe job, he escaped and startedturning around.

He duped four more personspromising jobs in the BHEL andcollected money to the tune ofRs 1.10 crore. The victimslodged a complaint with theRamachandrapuram police afterrealising that they had beendeceived by the fraudster.

Based on complaints lodgedby the victims, police launcheda man-hunt and traced Rajeshin Chandigarh and took himinto their custody on April 9.

The accused had earlier goneto jail in a case of cheating toprovide jobs in BHEL in a sim-ilar manner under variouspolice stations limits inHyderabad and CyberabadCommissionerates.

Alumni meetingturn tragic asman dies in bee attackPNS n WARANGAL

An alumni meeting in theWarangal district turned trag-ic when one of the alumnidied in a bee attack shockinghis batch mates, who gatheredto reminisce their memories,by interacting with theirschool friends.

According to details, pro-gramme was organised at theZilla Parishad SecondarySchool (ZPSS) in Mamnoor vil-lage of Warangal Urban districton Sunday. A 34-year-old mandied in a bee attack while theseven others, who sustainedserious injuries, were shifted tothe MGM hospital.

PNS n JAYASHANKER BHUPALAPALLY

Gadchiroli police on Sundayarrested a Maoist PartyDivision Committee mem-ber, who was injured in arecent crossfire inKobramenda forest area ofKurukheda taluka inMaharashtra's Gadchiroli dis-trict. Gadchiroli DistrictSuperintendent of PoliceAnkit Goyal said that KishoreKaudo alias Gongulu (38), amember of the Tippagad DalDVC in the district, wasarrested.

Kishore was injured whena bullet hit him in the leg dur-ing a recent encounterbetween the police andMaoists in the Cobramendaforest area.

Police received informa-tion that Kishore Kaudo washiding in Raman Tolo inAtapally taluka and took himinto their custody, but wasrushed to a hospital for treat-ment.

Ganpati Kohli, who hadcollaborated with Kishore,was also arrested. GadchiroliSP told the media that therewere several cases registeredagainst him.

Injured Maoistarrested

Maoist Kishore Kaudo, who wasarrested by the Gadchiroli police, isundergoing treatment at a hospital inMaharashtra

MARTHI SUBRAHMANYAM

n NAGARJUNASAGAR

Contestants for Nagarjunasagarbypoll K Jana Reddy ofCongress, who unsuccessfullycontested last time, and TRSnominee Nomula Bharat, son ofthe late MLA NomulaNarsimhaiah, have banked heav-ily on a sympathy wave.

The BJP’s impact is apparent-ly not significant in the polls.

The TRS and BJP targetedJana Reddy as their main rival.The polls will help the BJP toincrease its vote bank. As JanaReddy won all polls except twoso far is under tremendouspressure.

It may be recalled that JanaReddy was defeated byRammurthy Yadav and NomulaNarsimhaiah. Earlier, the peopleof the constituency had remorsefor having defeated Jana Reddyas many projects in the con-stituency were sanctioned dur-ing his regime. Jana Reddy iswell aware of mandals except forthe newly added ones.

He earned the image of GoodSamaritan among the partyleaders and people.

Even if he chides the localleaders, he has the habit of get-ting their job done. People havea soft corner towards Jana Reddyas he lost the polls twice becauseof his own mistakes. Currently,he is on his third leg of the cam-paign. As was done earlier, Jana’s

son Ravhuveer Reddy is takingcare of constituency affairs,including finalising strategy,reviewing progress with partyleaders from behind the screen.

Besides the Reddys, Andhrasettlers support Jana Reddy.The Congress, which has agood grip in thandas, is alsobanking on SC and ST votes forsuccess.

As the BJP is fielding tribalcandidate, the political equationwill change, say analysts.

Senior leaders Revanth

Reddy, N Uttam Kumar Reddy,Bhatti Vikramarka,Komatireddy Venkat Reddy,Shabbir Ali have been cam-paigning for Jana Reddy.

Nomula Bharat of TRS hasbeen exploiting the sympathywave. In urban areas, there issympathy for Bharat, whorecently lost his father. He is alsoactively involved in service-ori-ented programmes. During thelifetime of his father, he gaineda good grip over the constituen-cy.

Moreover, the Yadavas arenumerically strong hereafterthe SCs and STs. It is going tobenefit him. Moreover, the crit-icism against the late MLANomula Narsimhaiah was thathe benefited Yadavas more thanany other community.

Therefore, the BCs distancedthemselves from the TRS forc-ing the TRS to deploy BC lead-ers to campaign. BesidesMinister Talasani Srinivas Yadavand MLAs in the district took itas a matter of prestige to getBharat elected.

The BJP fielded a Dalit DrRavi Kumar. The Congress andTRS are worried over whosevotes the BJP is going to split.The BJP campaign picked upafter a weak start.

Ministers Kishan Reddy, DKAruna, former MP GarikapatiMohan Rao, along with their fol-lowers, have been camping inNagarjunasagar.

K VENKATESHWARLU

n HYDERABAD

Age does matter in politics?No, there is no age limit asPrime Minister NarendraModi crossed 70 years whileChief Minister KChandrasekhar Rao is 67-year-old. In fact, the leaders will getpivotal posts when their ageincreases and the young lead-ers would follow the footstepsof veteran leaders. However,TRS leaders are raising the agefactor in Nagarjunasagar by-elections.

Particularly, 69-year-oldHome Minister MohammedMahamood Ali has beenattacking 74-year-old andseven-time MLA and Congresscandidate K Jana Reddy, whowas in the fray in theNagarjunasagar by-elections,as an ‘outdated’ one and didnothing to the constituency.

The TRS leaders are almostsucceeding in getting an upperhand in the ongoingNagarjunasagar campaign crit-icising Jana Reddy in thismanner. Countering the TRSleaders, the Congress leadersare alleging that the TRS lead-ers have no status to criticisespotless politician K JanaReddy. With the date for elec-tions nearing, the intensity ofthe allegations and counter

allegations is on the rise. TheCongress leaders are statingthat experienced leader likeJana Reddy’s presence in theAssembly is a must to questionthe ruling party.

However, there are fiveMLAs, including SpeakerPocharam Srinivas Reddy andForest Minister A IndrakaranReddy, who crossed 70 yearsmark, along with MIM MLAMumtaz Ahmed Khan (72years), Vanama VenkateshwarRao (75 years), VM Abraham(74 years).

Meanwhile, KothagudemMLA Vanama VenkateshwaraRao, who was elected on theCongress ticket, joined theTRS, is the oldest MLA in theAssembly. If Jana Reddy wins,the number will reach six. Ifnot, the other (the 30s or 40s)the number will increase byone as TRS candidate NomulaBhagat is in his 30s whereasBJP candidate is in 40s.

Interestingly, there are 29

MLAs, including ChiefMinister K ChandrasekharRao and Ministers KoppulaEshwar, Chamakura MallaReddy, Errabelli Dayakar Raoand former Ministers T PadmaRao and T Rajaiah, DS RedyaNaik and others are in theirsweet 60s.

However, there are 53MLAs, who crossed the half-century mark in the presentAssembly, including MinistersEatala Rajender, VemulaPrashanth Reddy, SabithaIndra Reddy, Talasani SrinivasYadav, V Srinivas Goud, GJagdeesh Reddy, GangulaKamalakar. The CLP leaderMallu Bhatti Vikramarka is alssin the 50s group.

In the 40s club, there are 26MLAs, including Ministers THarish Rao, KT Rama Rao. Inthe 30s group, there are fivemembers, including Balka, PRohith Reddy 36, GuvvalaBalaraju, Gadari KishoreKumar and Haripriya Banoth.

BATTLE OF BALLOT IN N’SAGAR

In politics, age is just a number

NAGARJUNASAGAR BYPOLL

Jana Reddy, Nomula Bharatbank on sympathy wave

Karate useful in boosting confidence of girls: Collector PEDDAPALLI : District Colletor Dr Sangeeta Satyanarayana has calledupon students to shine their best not only in academics but also inspots. Participating in a programme to demonstrate skills of Karatestudents here on Sunday, he said that the sport would be useful inimproving discipline, confidence and provides entertainment to stu-dents. Karate is useful, especially for girls, in boosting their confi-dence. It is beneficial for students to learn gymnastics and Karatefrom young age and they would help in securing jobs. Additionalcollector local bodies Kumar Deepak, Karate students parents' asso-ciation president Kamal and others were present on the occasion.

Officials urged to gatherdetails of private school staff MEDCHAL-MALKAJGIRI: District Collector Sweta Mohanty has direct-ed district authorities to gather details of teaching and non-teachingstaff working in private schools in recognised schools of the district byApril 15 and upload them into online by April 28. There are over 1,286recognised schools in the district which employed 19,711 employees.Orders have been issued on policy guidelines and action plan. She saidthat more details would be gathered till Monday. Later, steps to extendthem government benefit would be taken, she added. As schoolsremained closed now, the teaching staff and non-teaching staff wouldreceive 25 kg of rice and Rs 2000 each from April, she said.

Centre to sterilise street dogs inaugurated SIDDIPET: Finance Minister T Harish Rao on Saturday night inaugu-rated a animal birth control centre, set up at a cost of Rs 60 lakh, atthe Government veterinary hospital here. He said that the governmentsolved the problem posed to the public health due to pigs, solved themonkey menace and now set up a centre to sterilise street dogs. Hesaid that the street dogs would be caught with the help of the traineddog catchers and brought to the centre to sterilise them before leavingthem back on streets. The dogs would be given anti-rabies drugs torule out people upon dog bite suffering from rabies. Daily 40 dogswould be caught and four of them would be sterilised. Municipachairman Raja Nars, SUDA chairman Ravinder Reddy, municipal com-missioner Ramanachari and others were present on the occasion.

Cases filed against TRS, BJPnominees for not wearing masksHYDERABAD: The Nalgonda police seized Rs 46.79 lakh cash andliquor worth Rs 35 lakh in the Nagarjunasagar constituency onSunday. Police registered six cases for violating convoy rules. Theysaid that they filed 68 cases for violating Corona protocol during thecampaign. They filed cases against TRS candidate Nomula BhagatKumar and BJP candidate Dr Ravi Naik for not wearing masks duringtheir campaign in the constituency. It may be recalled that the by-elec-tion will be held on April 17 and counting on May 2. K Jana Reddy iscontesting on the Congress ticket, Nomula Bhagat Kumar on the TRSand Dr Ravi Naik on the BJP ticket. The campaign will end on April 15.

Jeevan Reddy asks KCR tocancel meeting at HaliyaHYDERABAD: The Congress demanded that Chief Minister KChandrasekhar Rao cancel the public meeting to be conducted by theparty on April 14 at Haliya keeping the surge in Corona cases.Congress MLC T Jeevan Reddy said that the cases are increasing andsuggested to Nalgonda Collector and SP not to accord permission tothe proposed public meeting. He reminded that the neighbouringstate Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy hadcancelled his Tirupati meeting because of increasing Corona cases.He asked K Chandrasekhar Rao to cancel the proposed publicmeeting keeping public health in view.

Tenders invited to run police staff canteen MEDCHAL-MALKAJGIRI : Applications have been invited from con-tractors to run a staff canteen at the Rachakonda CAR police head-quarters who have three years of experience in running hotel or can-teen. The tender documents can be had from B-Section ofRachakonda police commissioner's office in Neredmet by paying Rs500 during office timings of 11 am and 4 pm on working days. Thelast date for submission of the tenders is 3 pm on April 20. The bidswould be opened at 4 pm on the same day. For further details contact7901151653.

SHORT TAKES

n AICC NationalSpokesperson SravanDasoju dashed out aletter to the ChiefMinister in which heurged to consider therising unemploymentin Telangana as a socialemergency andappealed to him toconstitute a specialTask Force to addressthe sensitive issue

HARISH AAT RRATHOSTAVAM

HYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021 nation 05

Revered Gujarat seerMahamandaleshwarBharti Bapu died on

Sunday morning at BhartiAshram in Sarkhej area ofAhmedabad. He was 93 anddied due to age relatedcomplications, a disciple said,adding that the last rites willbe performed at the Ashram'smain centre in Junagadh city. Condoling the death, Prime MinisterNarendra Modi tweeted. "The teachings of MahamandaleshwarVishwambhar Bharti Ji Maharaj of Junagadh Bharti Ashram willalways guide us. I offer my condolences to millions of his followers.May god give peace to his soul. Aum Shanti." "I am deeply pained bythe passing away of 1008 Mahamandaleshwar Bharti Bapu. We cannever forget his contribution of starting a nationwide movementagainst addictions. May god grant peace to his soul and give strengthto his followers to endure the pain," Union Home Minister Amit Shah

INDIA CORNER

PNS n NEW DELHI

Why are India's COVID-19cases flaring up so sharply?There are no clear answers buttop scientists say the complexinterplay of mutant strains, ahugely susceptible populationmade more vulnerable by elec-tions and other public eventsand the lowering of guard areprimarily to blame.

India's COVID tally hasclimbed to 1,33,58,805 (1.33crore, 13.3 million) with arecord spike of 1,52,879 dailycases, the Union HealthMinistry said on Sunday, inwhat many say is a second wavethat is surging more powerful-ly than the first. As Delhialone reported 10,732 freshcases, far exceeding its earlierpeak of 8,593 on November11, 2020, the number of activecases in the country breachedthe 11 lakh mark for the firsttime since the outbreak of thepandemic.

And just like there were no

answers to why there was aslide earlier this year, there isno clarity on why the numbersare rising so sharply.

While there are manyimponderables and many

things unknown, virologistsShahid Jameel and T JacobJohn are agreed that not follow-ing COVID-19 protocol,including informing peoplethey must continue with pre-

cautions even after being vac-cinated, and a sluggish vacci-nation drive are responsible.

Jameel said the interplay ofmutants and vaccines over thenext couple of months will

decide the future of Covid inIndia and the world.

“The intensity of the surgealso suggests that there were ahuge number of susceptiblepeople after the first wave,” thedirector of the Trivedi Schoolof Biosciences at AshokaUniversity in Haryana toldPTI.

The Centre warned earlierthis week that the next fourweeks are critical and people'sparticipation in helping controlthe second wave of the conta-gion is pivotal. NITI AayogMember (Health) V K Paulsaid the pandemic situation hasworsened with a sharp rise incases and a large part of thepopulation still susceptible tothe virus, without giving anyclear explanation on why thisis happening.

The fact that people loweredthe guard and didn't followCovid protocols after the firstwave was over is “certainly onevalid explanation” for the surge,Jameel said.

Covid surge due to mutants,carelessness: Scientists PNS n NEW DELHI

BJP president J P Naddaasked party members onSunday to work to make the'Tika Utsav', which aims toinoculate maximum numberof eligible people againstcoronavirus, successful andhelp keep the society healthy.

He urged BJP members tofol low Prime MinisterNarendra Modi's suggestionsfully to make the drive a suc-cess.

Asserting that the vaccina-tion drive between April 11and 14 marks the beginningof the second big war onCOVID-19, Modi on Sundaymade several suggestions topeople on tackling the virus

and urged them to focus onpersonal and social hygiene.

Elderly people or thosewho may not be much edu-cated should be helped in get-ting the vaccine, he said, andalso asked people to help

those COVID-19 patients ingetting treatment who maylack resources or informa-tion.

By wearing masks, peoplecan save themselves and oth-ers, Modi added.

Make 'Tika Utsav'a success,Nadda tells BJP members

PNS n NEW DELHI

On the occasion of NationalSafe Motherhood Day onSunday, experts said maternalhealth and family planningservices should not be compro-mised and given due priorityeven in emergency situationslike the COVID-19 pandemic.

National Safe MotherhoodDay is observed every year onApril 11 on the birth anniver-sary of Kasturba Gandhi, wifeof Mahatma Gandhi.

The experts also called forstrengthening the country'shealth system.

"We have witnessed a steeprise in maternal deaths duringthe COVID-19 pandemic. Thenationwide lockdown disrupt-ed maternal health services,which resulted in a decline in

institutional deliveries as wellas women's access to prenataland antenatal services," saidPoonam Muttreja, ExecutiveDirector of PopulationFoundation of India and apublic health expert.

She said the fear of gettinginfected as well as limitedaccess to health services has ledto depression and anxietyamong young mothers whichis expected to impact healthoutcomes for both women andinfants in the long run.

"Going forward, health sys-tem strengthening is vital toensure maternal health andfamily planning services aregiven due priority and aren'tcompromised even in emer-gency situations like theCOVID-19 pandemic,"Muttreja told PTI.

Maternal health should get priority during Covid: Experts

Mahamandaleshwar Bharti Bapu dies at 93

Congress party'sSrivilliputhur constituencycandidate in the April 6

Tamil Nadu Assemblypolls, P S W Madhava Raodied on Sunday due to COVID-19 complications, his familysaid. Rao was 63 years old andis survived by his onlydaughter. He died at a privatehospital in Madurai this morning where he was admitted on March 20for treatment, Rao's son-in-law, K Rajiv told P T I. Congress partysecretary and Tamil Nadu incharge Sanjay Dutt tweeted saying he wasdeeply pained to learn about the demise of Rao due to COVID-19complications. "Our heartfelt condolences to his family. We standwith them in this hour of grief & pray may his soul rest inpeace," Dutt said. AIADMK top leader O Panneerselvam and DMKpresident M K Stalin expressed shock and grief over Rao's death.Deputy Chief Minister Panneerselvam conveyed hiscondolences to the bereaved family and the Congress party.

Cong candidate in TN pollsMadhava Rao dies of Covid

The senior doctor in agovernment hospital inMadhya Pradesh who had

resigned after Congress MLAPC Sharma allegedlymisbehaved with himfollowing the death ofa patient, withdrew hisdecision on Sunday, a ministersaid. Madhya Pradesh HealthMinister Prabhuram Choudharysaid Dr Yogendra Shrivastava has agreed to take back hisresignation on the assurance that action will be taken intothe "unfortunate" incident. Dr Shrivastava had resigned after somepoliticians misbehaved with him, following the death of a patient whowas critically ill, Government JP hospital civil surgeon Dr RakeshShrivastava had said on Saturday. A video of the incident, which wentviral on social media, showed former minister PC Sharma and formerCongress corporator Yogendra Chouhan purportedly shouting at DrYogendra Shrivastava. "I talked with Dr Yogendra Shrivastava andtold him that the state desperately needs doctors during this difficulttime of coronavirus outbreak. I requested him to withdraw hisresignation and assured him of action in the unfortunate

MP doctor withdraws resignationafter Minister assures action

Maharashtra hasadministered COVID-19vaccine doses to over

one crore people so far, asenior health official said onSunday. The vaccination drivebegan on January 16 this yearacross the country and iscurrently underway for front-line and health care workers,and people aged 45 years andabove. "We have crossed one crore doses today. Till today noon, wehave administered 1,00,38,421 doses," Maharashtra's principalsecretary (health) Pradeep Vyas said in a statement. Amid reports ofMaharashtra facing an acute shortage of the doses, hampering itsimmunisation drive, Union minister Prakash Javadekar on Saturday saidthe state has received 1.10 crore doses of the anti-COVID-19 vaccinesso far. Apart from Maharashtra, Gujarat and Rajasthan are the two otherstates that have received more than one crore doses, Javadekar hadsaid. On the blame game between the Centre and the stategovernment over the availability of vaccine doses, the BJPleader had said this was not the right time to do politics.

Maharashtra crosses onecrore vaccination mark

PNS n INDORE

A severe spike in COVID-19cases in Mumbai and persistenttalk of a "complete lockdown"there to tackle it has, like last year,made the national highway num-ber 3 skirting past MadhyaPradesh's commercial hub Indorea prime route for wary migrantsreturning home to states likeUttar Pradesh and Bihar.

The number of motorcycles,black-and-yellow mini trucksand autorickshaws, teeming withmigrants, have been on the riseover the past few days on a bypassroad connected to this route,popularly known as Mumbai-Agra road, eye-witnesses said onSunday.

"The virus outbreak has onceagain got very severe in

Mumbai. There might be a

lockdown and it may, like lastyear, render us jobless. So we havedecided to return home," saidRamsharan Singh (40), makinghis way back to Ballia in UttarPradesh in an autorickshaw.

Similar is the case withMohammad Shadab, going back

to his hometown in Bihar'sBhojpur district.

"I work in a restaurant inMumbai. I will think of return-ing there if the situationimproves. Or else, I plan to stayback in Bihar and look for work,"he said.

PNS n NAGPUR

Union minister NitinGadkari has called up SunPharma's chief to arrangefor 10,000 injections ofRemdesivir in Nagpur inview of a shortage of themedicine here in Maharashtra.Remdesivir is consid-ered a key anti-viral drug inthe fight against COVID-19,especially in adult patientswith severe complications.A press release fromGadkari's office on Saturdaysaid the Lok Sabha memberfrom Nagpur spoke to SunPharma's Managing DirectorDilip Shanghvi over phone toinform him about the situa-tion here and appealed to himto make available theRemdesivir injections. Thepharma company chiefassured Gadkari of makingavailable 5,000 injectionsimmediately on Saturday andthe remaining 5,000 in nexttwo-three days, the releasesaid. Gadkari also appealed tothe people of Nagpur to fol-low all COVID-19 preventionprotocols.

Amid Mumbai lockdown talk, migrantmovement seen on MP route

Remdesivir shortage inNagpur; Gadkari dialsSun Pharma chief

PNS n MUMBAI

The Maharashtra govern-ment has decided to set updistrict-level control roomsto ensure smooth supply ofRemdesivir injections andprevent hoarding and black-marketing of the drug, offi-cials said on Sunday.

Remdesivir is considereda key medicine in the fightagainst COVID-19, espe-cially in adult patients withsevere complications.

The state is facing multi-ple issues pertaining to thedrug, like demand-supplygap, its hoarding and black-marketing by stockists andpharmacy shops, unafford-able prices and irrationalprescription by some doc-tors.

Maharashtra's health ser-vices commissionerRamaswami N, in a letterdated April 9, has written toall district collectors in thestate to set up control rooms

to streamline the supply ofthe key anti-viral drug. ChiefMinister Uddhav Thackerayrecently reviewed the situa-tion with state HealthMinister Rajesh Tope,Medical Education MinisterAmit Deshmukh, Food andDrug Administration (FDA)Minister Rajendra Shingneand Urban DevelopmentMinister Eknath Shinde.

The government hasasked authorities to cap theprice of Remdesivir betweenRs 1,100 and Rs 1,400 pervial and urged about a dozenpharmaceutical companiesmanufacturing the drug toramp-up its production andlower its MRP (maximumretail price).

It has also asked the healthservices commissioner toput in place a separatemechanism to streamlinethe supply of Remdesivir, inthe wake of a rise in itsdemand due to a surge inCOVID-19 cases.

Maha to set upcontrol rooms forRemdesivir supply

PNS n MUMBAI

The NIA on Sunday arrest-ed police off icer RiyazKazi, an associate of sus-pended cop Sachin Waze,in connection with the caseof an explosives-laden SUVfound near industrialistMukesh Ambani 's resi-dence, a police official said.

Assistant police inspec-tor (API) Kazi was calledfor questioning again bythe National InvestigationAgency (NIA) on Sundayand later placed underarrest, he said.

He was previously alsoquestioned multiple timesby the NIA in connectionwith the case of the SUVwith explosives found nearA mb an i ' s re s i d e n c e i nsouth Mumbai on February25 and the subsequentdeath of Thane business-

man Mansukh Hiran. Afterhis arrest on Sunday, Kaziwas produced before a hol-iday cour t here whichremandedhim in the NIA'scustody till April 16 forfurther probe into the case.

Kazi was shunted out ofthe Mumbai Crime Branchlast month, the officialsaid.

E ar l i e r, i n a C C T Vfootage, Kazi was seenentering a number platesshop in suburban Vikhroliand having a conversationwith the outlet's owner.

Waze's aide held

PNS n SRINAGAR

Four militants from Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) and al-Badroutfits, including thoseinvolved in the killing of an off-duty Territorial Army soldierin Anantnag on Friday, weregunned down on Sunday intwo encounters with securityforces in Jammu and Kashmir,police said.

With this, the death toll inthe encounters that began onSaturday in Anantnag andShopian has climbed to five asone militant was killed in theinitial exchange of fire.

Towseef Ahmad Bhat andAamir Hussain Ganie, bothfrom Bijbehara and linked tothe LeT, were killed at villageSemthan in the Bijbehara area

of south Kashmir's Anantnagdistrict after they refused tosurrender and fired indiscrim-inately on a search party, thepolice said.

“Both of them were wantedin many terror crimes includ-ing the killing of an off-duty

Territorial Army soldierMohammad Saleem Akhoonnear his home in GoriwanBijbehara on Friday. They werealso wanted in the case of anattack on a CRPF party inwhich a CRPF jawan waskilled,” an official said.

Four terrorists killed in J&K encounters

PNS n MUMBAI

The ruling Shiv Sena inMaharashtrahas appealed tothe Centre to take a uniformdecision on the board exams ofClasses 10 and 12 across thecountry in the wake of theCOVID-19 pandemic.

A unilateral decision by anystate would lead to students ofthat statebeing at a disadvan-tage in terms of career andopportunities, Shiv Sena's chiefspokesperson Arvind Sawantsaid in a letter, dated April 10,addressed to Union EducationMinister Ramesh Pokhriyal'Nishank'.

"Your intervention wouldmean national consensus,instead of a unilateral decisionby any particular state," Sawantsaid in his letter.

‘Take uniformdecision on Class10, 12 exams’

PNS n NEW DELHI

The CBI on Sunday calledpersonal assistants of formerMaharashtra Home MinisterAnil Deshmukh for ques-tioning in connection withallegations of corruption lev-elled against him by ex-

Mumbai police commission-er Param Bir Singh, officialssaid.

Sanjeev Palande andKundan have been asked toappear before the CBI teamfor questioning in connectionwith the preliminary enquiryregistered by the agency on

the directives of the BombayHigh Court, they said.

In a letter, Singh hadalleged that Palande was pre-sent when Deshmukhallegedly asked suspendedcop Sachin Waze, facing NIAprobe in the case of explosiveladen SUV found near indus-

trialist Mukesh Ambani'shouse, to allegedly extortover Rs 100 crore a monthfrom bars and restaurants ofMumbai, they said.

Waze, in his statement, hadreportedly claimed thatKundan was present duringone such conversation

Deshmukh’s PAs called for questioning

PNS n SRINAGAR

Four militants, includingthose responsible for thekilling of an Army man inAnantnag district, were killedin two overnight encounterswith security forces in Jammuand Kashmir on Sunday,police said.

The total number of mili-tants killed in the twin encoun-ters – which began on Saturday– in Shopian and Anantnagdistricts – has risen to five asan unidentified militant waskilled late on Saturday.

“Two militants were killedin the encounter at Semthanin Bijbehara area of Anantnagdistrict of south Kashmir,” apolice official said.

He said the encounterbegan on Saturday after secu-rity forces launched a cordonand search operation in thearea following inputs aboutthe presence of militantsthere. The exchange of firewent on till late evening andthe security forces main-tained a tight cordon of thearea during the night to stopthe ultras from fleeing.

Four militantskilled inencounters in J-K

PNS n MUMBAI

Producer Ekta Kapoor'sstreaming platform ALTBalajion Sunday apologised andremoved the poster of show"His Storyy" from its socialmedia pages after filmmakerSudhanshu Saria alleged itwas copied from the artworkof his film "Loev". Saria, whobagged the National Award forbest direction last month forhis feature "Knock KnockKnock", took to Twitter overthe weekend and shared theposter of his acclaimed 2015

same-sex romantic-drama,which featured the film's twoleads lying in an embrace.Theposter of "His Storyy", sharedby ALTBalaji on its socialmedia pages, also showed thecentral characters in astrikingly similar position.Saria called out the streamerfor "blatantly" copying hisposter and wrote the culture ofplagiarising an artwork "mustend." In a statement posted onTwitter, ALTBalaji said theresemblance between the twoposters cannot be passed offas "mere coincidence."

Ekta Kapoor's ALTBalaji apologisesfor alleged poster plagiarism

there arose the question ofwho would be the next man-aging director of the BritishCeylon Corporation, a Britishfirm similar to the one we hadin Kanpur, the British IndiaCorporation, until the early1960s. My father-in-law saidthat one Ramaswamy, a localTamil, was the ablest choicebut was unlikely to get the pro-motion. The prize was likelyto go to DM Pereira as he wasa Sinhala. The existing Boardof directors was largely British,headed by a distinguishedgentleman called Singleton-Salmon. There was no partial-ity in the company but theemerging milieu in Colombowas such. Ramaswamy waslikely to emigrate to Australia.

My father-in-lawexplained that the Sinhalaswere an overwhelming major-ity, an easy-going, fun-lovingBuddhist people. They werejealous of the Tamils whowere serious at work, andmore efficient. There haddeveloped a wedge betweenthe two groups as far back asthen. Their differences werebound to explode sooner orlater. The fact that the peopleof Tamil Nadu have a soft cor-ner in their hearts for their SriLankan brethren is natural but

that makes the Sinhalas sus-pect Indian intentions fromtime to time. When RajivGandhi was India’s PrimeMinister and President JRJayewardene headed Sri Lanka,we sent the IPKF military tohelp the Tamils. Instead ofhelping them, we only killedthem and left the Sinhalasalone. This indicates that ourGovernments have mostly notunderstood Sri Lankan affairs.

Colombo’s rulers smile atNew Delhi and pretend to befriendly although they feelthat the faraway yellow giantis less dangerous than theIndian giant, only 40 km tothe north. They did appreci-ate the IPKF’s help for sometime; thereafter it became adistant memory. Lankaappears to have erred inowing China all the moneyfor upgrading theHambantota port as well as ahighway from Colombo toGalle and further south. If SriLanka cannot repay the loanin time, these may be takenover as Chinese property. YetColombo would rather dealwith Beijing than New Delhi.This mentality is likely to con-tinue indefinitely until Indiatakes a drastic stop to relievethe Sinhalas of their Tamil

suspicions. From the Indianpoint of view, there is the fear,however remote, that one daythe Chinese may convert SriLanka into a yellow colony.

What should New Delhido? Consider whether we canoffer a transfer of willing SriLankan Tamils to theAndaman Islands. They are acommunity of four millionpeople, mainly in the Jaffnaarea in the northeast of SriLanka and some scatteredacross the east of the island.The Andamans occupy about9,000 sq km with only aboutfour lakh people. Not all SriLankan Tamils are likely toaccept the transfer. For thosewilling, Sri Lanka should paya total `2 lakh per headtowards resettlement, conve-nience costs and compensa-tion. This means several billionrupees for Sri Lanka to borrowor somehow fork out, but asmall cost for solving theirgreatest problem. India’sadvantage would be populat-ing the Andaman Islands,which makes Tamils’ survivalsafer, Tamil Nadu happier andthe Indo-Sri Lankan relationspermanently suspicion-free.

(The writer is a well-knowncolumnist and an author. Theviews expressed are personal.)

In a politically sensitive development ahead of the Uttarakhand Assembly elections inFebruary 2022, Chief Minister Tirath Singh Rawat-led BJP Government has overturnedhis predecessor Trivendra Singh Rawat’s decision enabling the Government to take

over the management of 51 prominent temples and shrines. Trivendra’s argument hadbeen that the new Act would help in the profession-al management of these shrines. The Act paved theway for setting up the Devasthanam Board, which waschaired by the Chief Minister. The Board was meantto control the management of renowned temples suchas Badrinath, Kedarnath, Gangotri and Yamunotri; theannual pilgrimage to these temples is popularly calledthe Char Dham Yatra and is a money-spinner not onlyfor the temples but also for allied businesses like thetravel, hotel and tourism industries. In 2019, over threemillion people visited the four shrines, though 2020was a damp squib owing to the COVID outbreak. Mostworryingly for the seers, the Act had the provision tosack a priest found involved in any “wrongdoing”. It

had been a long-pending demand of these teerth purohits (pilgrimage priests) that theGovernment roll back its decision as, they pointed out, they have been managing forgenerations the affairs of these temples, which were set up by their ancestors.

Now, though it can’t be truthfully claimed that everything was hunky-dory at thesereligious establishments when their affairs were being managed by the respective teerthpurohits, there’s also no denying the fact that the State Government’s move must nothave spawned from any idea of piousness or welfare for the pilgrims, who descendon the hill State from across the length and breadth of the country. It is true that theinfrastructure at the halting places leading to these places of worship is in a dilapi-dated condition and excessive commercialisation there has massively added to thenature’s burden, the result of which we all saw in the tragic Kedarnath flash floodsof 2013. However, the Government didn’t stir all along to ameliorate the pathetic con-ditions. We would suggest that rather than taking extreme positions, let the templemanagement remain with the teerth purohits but, at the same time, the Governmentshould keep an eye on them and the way they run the temple affairs and oversee theupkeep, facilities and amenities there.

India seems to be back to square one where fighting the pandemic is concerned,with more than 70 vaccination centres in Mumbai having shut down after runningout of the COVID doses. Other parts of the country, too, like Punjab, Rajasthan, Delhi

and Uttar Pradesh, are facing a shortage of the coveted shots. And this shortage isbeing faced despite there being major vaccine hesitancy in the country and the inoc-ulation drive still not open to all. How massive the shortage would become if theGovernment decides to vaccinate all citizens is anybody’s guess. When the pandem-ic began over a year ago, India was faced with the harsh reality of a poor healthcareinfrastructure, shortage of hospital beds, ventilators, healthcare professionals, sani-

tisers, drugs and the know-how regarding the han-dling of the contagion. However, to the Government’sand India Inc’s credit, our “jugaadu” spirit kickedin and we overcame all these shortages by manu-facturing everything in India and even reached a pointwhere we began exporting PPEs, sanitisers and soon. Even where the vaccine was concerned, we sur-prised the world by coming out with two vaccines;in fact, India began gifting or selling vaccines to coun-tries around the world. All this was done parallel toour own ambitious countrywide vaccination drive.As the first wave of the outbreak seemed to sub-side, it gave the Centre’s vaccine diplomacy a shot

in the arm. It looked like we had it all under control, till the second wave hit.Now, it seems that we have not learnt any lessons from the first wave and pre-

pared ourselves better to handle the inevitable second wave, which empirical evi-dence suggests is always worse than the first one. So not only are we again facinga bed and oxygen shortage, we are beginning to fall short of the vaccines as well.A political slugfest has broken out over the issue with Maharashtra alleging that theCentre was “discriminating” against the non-BJP ruled States and the Government,for its part, accusing the States of having a lackadaisical attitude. A hectic debateis also on within the country whether charity should begin at home and the Governmentshould have ensured that all of its citizens were covered first before exporting theshots. After all, even the US, the leader of the free world, has banned all exportsuntil it vaccinates its own citizens. Be that as it may, the fact that we were not pre-pared to handle the inevitable second wave is a collective failure: Of the healthcaresystem, the policy planners, the bureaucracy, the Centre, States and the people asa whole. To make matters worse, some European regulators are talking about a pos-sible link between the AstraZeneca vaccine (available in India under the brand nameCovishield) and some rare occurrences of blood clots. Though the Indian panel on‘adverse event following immunisation’ is studying the safety of Covishield, it willbe some time before it gives its verdict. So, for now, it remains to be seen how ouringenuity gets us out of this jam.

Shot shortage

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

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

HYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021

06

DeliveranceUttarakhand has decided to free 51 shrines from the

Govt's control and hand these back to the priests

The issues between Sri Lankan Tamils and the Sinhalas may be

resolved if India concurs to transfer the former to the Andamans

PICTALK

A 3,000-year-old lost city in Luxor, Egypt, which was unearthed recently AP/PTI

IF WE CAN OFFERA TRANSFER OF WILLING

SRI LANKAN TAMILSTO THE ANDAMANS,INDIA'S ADVANTAGE

WOULD BEPOPULATING THE

ANDAMAN ISLANDS,WHICH MAKES

TAMILS' SURVIVALSAFER, TAMIL NADU

HAPPIER AND THEINDO-SRI LANKAN

RELATIONSPERMANENTLY

SUSPICION-FREE

PRAFULL GORADIA

Amid a plethora of issues, from safety to availability,the second wave of pandemic has hit India hard

Of Sri Lanka andthe Andamans

Two communities notbeing able to coexist is aperennial problem inthe Indian subcontinent.

An old saying goes, “Ek myaanmein do talwarein nahi reh sakti”,meaning two swords cannot fitinto one scabbard. The problembegan by being underscored inour own India, which was divid-ed into Pakistan for Muslims andHindustan for the rest. MAJinnah argued that Hindus andMuslims were two separatenations and could not coexist.The first leader to push this two-nation thesis was Sir SyedAhmad Khan of Aligarh fame.

Some UP Muslims believedtheir new country, Pakistan,was a new Medina. Muslims inthe western wing despised east-erner Bengalis as inferior, shortand dark. Their economy wasexploited from day one. Jinnahvisited Dacca early in 1948 andperemptorily told universitystudents that Urdu alone wouldbe Pakistan’s national language.Bengali, which they are proudof, was not in the reckoning.The two wings were daggersdrawn from 1948; the clashcame in 1971, in less than 24years of the new Medina’s birth.In December that year, they sep-arated; Bangladesh was born.

Thus, India was dividedinto three. Now we hear that thepeople of Sindh wish to sepa-rate. This separatist movementis called “Jio Sindh”. They areunable to exist under the yokeof the dominant Punjabis.Baluchistan is another unhap-py province which was partlyBritish India and partly theprincely State of Kalat. It had anEmbassy in Karachi until 1948when Pakistan forcibly took itover. The Pathans of the North-West Frontier Province(NWFP) with their main city,Peshawar, have always wished tounite with all Pathans inAfghanistan, though thisdemand is dormant now.

With Sri Lanka, it is an oldproblem. I visited my in-laws-to-be in Colombo in 1964 as theywanted to introduce me to theirsociety in the city where they hadlived and worked for 32 years. Inthe course of my four-day stay,

SOUNDBITEAMP UP VACCINE PRODUCTIONSir — In a letter to Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, Congress leader RahulGandhi has rightly questioned the Centre’sdecision to export COVID-19 vaccines. Itseems that the export was also an oversight,like many other decisions of the NDAGovernment. It also cannot be denied thatit was an effort to garner publicity at thecost of our own citizens.

The Government, before launching theworld’s largest vaccination drive shouldhave calculated the domestic demand andsupply. As several States are now allegingshortage of vaccines, it is time for theCentre to completely stop their export.India played the vaccine diplomacy cardthinking that it was close to developingherd immunity. New Delhi wasn’t granti-ng or exporting vaccines to only the poornations but also to the UK, Saudi Arabiaand Canada. Despite India’s stupendousefforts to vaccinate at a large scale, major-ity of the people are outside its purview.This is situation when there exists an agecriteria to get vaccinated. It’s not hard toimagine the situation if this age bar isremoved and everybody is allowed to getvaccinated.

The current situation might lead to anincrease in the prices of vaccines or, if thepharmaceutical companies ramp up pro-duction without increasing the prices, thequality will definitely get compromised.The Centre and State Governments mustgive up politics and find an amicable solu-tion to this problem which will likely aggra-vate in the coming days if viable answersare not explored and worked upon.

Bhagwan Thadani | Mumbai

NEED TO TAKE IT SERIOUSLY Sir — It should be a cause of worry for NewDelhi that the US Navy recently carried outa Freedom of Navigation Operation(FONOP) in India’s Exclusive EconomicZone (EEZ) without its prior consent tochallenge India’s “excessive” maritimeclaims. According to the statement issuedby the Commander of the US’ Seventh

Fleet, the operation was conducted by guid-ed-missile destroyer USS John Paul Joneson April 7 and is consistent with the inter-national law. The Ministry of ExternalAffairs responded that the Government’sstated position on the UN convention onthe Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) is that theConvention does not authorise otherStates to carry out operations in the EEZ.What is shocking is that it came at a timewhen India and the US are trying tostrengthen their ties and working in closecooperation in Quad for a free and openIndo-Pacific. US President Joe Biden’s“tough talk” on China shows thatWashington sees Beijing as its rival.However, the recent US misadventure canharm its good rapport with New Delhi.

TV Jayaprakash | Palakkad

NO REASON TO LOWER GUARD Sir — We are responsible for the rise in

the Coronavirus cases as we have loweredour guard and are not following theguidelines. People must understand thatit is necessary to break the chain of trans-missions to curb the spread of theCoronavirus.

The vaccines are no panacea. Not fol-lowing the appropriate COVID-19 behav-iour is not just laxity but is a criminal actas it is a major reason for the surge. Afterthe vaccination programme kickstarted,people felt they should not wear masks.Many people hang their masks aroundtheir neck, some keep it in their pocket andsome do not use it at all. It is only after suchgross negligence and laxity on the part ofpeople that Coronavirus cases have start-ed increasing.

Jubel D’Cruz | Mumbai

Send yyour ffeedback tto:letterstopioneer@gmail.com

It refers to the editorial ‘Tightening thescrews' (April 10). I fully concur with theeditorial view that the Central Bureau of

Investigation (CBI) and the NationalInvestigation Agency (NIA) should work in tan-dem to unravel the Anil Deshmukh and SachinVaze maze. If tainted police officials and politi-cians can work hand-in-glove, then why notour sleuths? The revelations made by arrest-ed police officer Vaze are disturbing. It shows

how rotten our whole system is and there isan open loot of public money. It seems thatthings like extortion, killings, transfer of hon-est officials, nepotism or using political influ-ence to get Government contracts havebecome the order of the day in Maharashtra.Not only this, it can also not be denied thatthe links of corrupt police officials like Vazeand politicians like Deshmukh must be withMaoists or terrorists, else from where thegelatin sticks used in Antilia bomb scare casecame?

Both the agencies must also focus theirinvestigation on these lines. Corrupt politicianswhen in power at the State or the Centre givepatronage to criminals and anti-social ele-ments in a quid pro quo so that they may usethem as and when required. Nothing couldbe more shameful for the MaharashtraGovernment than the recent happenings andthe alleged involvement of Deshmukh in gravecorruption. It must be investigated properlyand the accused should not be spared.

Abhishek Singh |Varanasi

Nix the corruption in Maharashtra COVID is surging andit is our responsibilityto push theGovernment to moveaway from PR tacticsand act in the interestof the people.

Congress interim president—Sonia Gandhi

Iran proposes the logical path to full JointComprehensivePlan of Actioncompliance. The

US, which caused this crisis, shouldreturn to full compliance first.

Iranian Foreign Minister

— Mohammad Javad Zarif

My parents organiseda celebration on theeve of my birthday inadvance as asurprise! I'm theluckiest person in theworld to have such parents.

Actor— Swara Bhasker

Lockdown is not anoption. However, wewill be putting somerestrictions in place tocontain the spread ofthe virus.

Delhi CM — Arvind Kejriwal

The Opposition gets nervous aboutAB de Villiers. Wehave depth in battingwhich we want toutilise. AB is probably

the only one in the team who is soversatile.

Cricketer — Virat Kohli

LETTERS TO TTHE EDITOR

The big tent of thePPP decoded

THE CRPF HAS SHOT FOUR PEOPLE IN COOCH BEHAR.

THERE’S A CONSPIRACY UNDER THE HOME

MINISTER’S ORDER AND THIS INCIDENT IS PROOF.

—WEST BENGAL CM

MAMATA BANERJEE

DIDI AND HER GOONS ARE PERTURBED, SEEING THE

PEOPLE’S SUPPORT FOR THE BJP. SHE HAS STOOPED

TO THIS LEVEL AS SHE CAN SEE HERSELF LOSING.

—PRIME MINISTER

NARENDRA MODI

The nutshell identity of the Pakistan PeoplesParty (PPP) is still slotted on the left sideof the conventional political divide. But

over the decades and, especially after the end ofthe Cold War in 1991, the nature of this dividehas continued to transform. According toRichard Gunther and Larry Diamond in the 2003issue of the Journal of Political Parties, by the1990s, the mainstream Right and Left of elec-toral politics had become the status quo, whichbegan being challenged by new “anti-status quo”groups. Gunther and Diamond write that theroots of large electoral Right/Centre-Right par-ties can be found in the 19th century, when theyemerged as a reaction to monarchism or partiesentirely driven by the aristocratic elite.

Ironically, this means that what evolved tobecome mainstream Right parties in the 20thcentury were originally on the Left in the 19thcentury because they represented the interestsof the emerging middle classes that advocatedcapitalism, individualism and religious freedomand/or “classical liberalism.”

Once such parties succeeded in becomingpart of the new status quo, they began to be chal-lenged by parties stressing the need to regulatecapitalism through various variations of social-ism. Therefore, the latter came to be understoodas electoral outfits that were on the left of theestablished classical liberal parties, which werenow slotted on the right side of the divide.

In his book ‘Sociologie Politique’, French soci-ologist M Duverger writes that, because of thechallenges posed by socialist parties, someclassical liberal parties appropriated religion toexpand their appeal but remained rooted in thepost-19th century secular political paradigm. TheConservative Party in Britain, the RepublicanParty in the US and the Christian Democraticparties in Europe can be seen as examples of this.The mainstream Left parties were quick to adoptthe same. Eventually, large parties on both sidesof the divide became what are called the “bigtent” or “catch-all” parties.

These parties retain an ideological core,which can be Left or Right, but they positionthemselves toward the Centre of the spectrum,appearing moderate in their policy prefer-ences. “Big tent” parties become platforms forvaried political players as long as they have evena semblance of recognition of the party’s core ide-ological purpose. However, it is pragmatism thatbecomes the overriding nature of “catch-all” par-ties.

The PPP was formed in 1967. It was initial-ly conceived by the Marxist intellectual JA Rahimas a vehicle for the charismatic politician ZABhutto. The 39-year-old Bhutto had been partof the Ayub Khan dictatorship but was oustedfrom the Cabinet in 1966. Bhutto positionedhimself as the man who had “stood up to a dic-tator.” This gained him traction with universi-ty and college students.

According to Rahim’s analysis, the Ayubregime’s economic policies had accelerated theradicalisation of Pakistan’s bourgeoise, widenedthe gap between the rich and the poor, and anorganised socialist party was not only the needof the hour, but would also be able to fill the vac-uum created after Ayub’s inevitable departure.

A reading of the PPP’sFoundation Papers makes it clearthat, right from the onset, itsfounders saw the PPP as a “bigtent” party modelled on estab-lished Social Democratic parties ofEurope. Rahim believed that thecountry’s bourgeoise had beguntheir march towards a revolution-ary phase, just as the Europeanmiddle classes had done in the19th century. Yet, at the time, amajority of Pakistanis lived inrural areas and the process ofindustrialisation, though rapidduring the Ayub era, was still con-centrated in just a few urban cen-tres.

When the party was launched,it exhibited three main groupings:On the Left were Marxist studentleaders, socialist intellectuals, tradeunionists and peasant leaders. Onthe Right were “progressive” land-ed elite and in the Centre werewhat became to be known as“Islamic socialists”, or those whoappropriated Islam as a welfaristand socialist doctrine, as opposedto a theological expression of pol-itics (à la Jamaat-i-Islami).

During the 1970 elections, theparty’s “big tent” tactics were a suc-cess, aiding it to attract the major-ity of middle and lower-middleclass votes, and the votes of smallfarmers and peasants in (West)Pakistan’s two largest provinces,

Punjab and Sindh.In December 1971, the party

suddenly found itself in powerafter the acrimonious departure ofEast Pakistan. The party’s Leftwing was more assertive duringBhutto’s first year in power. But thisassertion was stalled when Bhuttobegan perceiving the party’s radi-cal Left as agents of anarchy witha juvenile understanding ofMarxism.

According to Gunther andDiamond, in an effort to expandtheir electoral appeal to a widevariety of groups, the policy orien-tations of “big tent” parties wereeclectic and shifted with the pub-lic mood. In Pakistan, because ofcertain overarching internationaleconomic shifts, the mood wasclearly shifting to the Right. In thesecond half of Bhutto’s tenure, theregime tried to appropriate thismood and, by the time theGovernment fell in 1977, the partybelieved it had upstaged the far-Right Islamist groups that wereopposing it.

But it seems that the party didnot go far enough and was toppledby an Islamist General. With itsleader hanged in 1979, and itsother major players either in exileor in prison, the reins of the partyfell in the hands of its lower-tierleadership. Bhutto’s daughterBenazir was at the helm, but she

was under arrest. This was alsowhen the party’s leftist militanttendencies, which had been sub-dued by Bhutto, resurfaced. In1986, however, fearing that the USwould stall the party’s return topower for being “too Left-wing”,Benazir began to gradually pushthe party back towards the Centre.

This push continued throughthe 1990s, especially with theappearance of the PakistaniMuslim League-Nawaz (PML-N)as the “big tent” party of theRight. Under Asif Ali Zardari, thePPP has dug its heels deep in prag-matist centrism. Its electoral appealin Punjab was neutralised by thePML-N and then the PakistanTehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). This hasblocked its path to Islamabad as aruling party.

The PPP continues to enjoypower and electoral traction inSindh. But this traction is largelybased on the fact that the Sindhispeakers perceive the PPP as abridge between them and the eco-nomic and political fruits of fed-eralism. For this, the PPP needs tocontinue having a strong presencein federal institutions.

This is why it was importantfor Zardari to recently bag amajority in the Senate, even if heended up upsetting his allies in theanti-Government PakistanDemocratic Movement.

Pragmatic centrism and the need to remain a bridge between Sindh’s electorate and thepolitical fruits of federalism may help explain why the PPP made a grab for the Senate

RIYA RAHIMAN

IN PAKISTAN,BECAUSE OF

CERTAINOVERARCHING

INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC

SHIFTS, THEMOOD WAS

CLEARLY SHIFTING TO THE

RIGHT. IN THESECOND HALF OF

BHUTTO’S TENURE,THE REGIME TRIED

TO APPROPRIATETHIS MOOD AND,BY THE TIME THE

GOVERNMENT FELL IN 1977,

THE PARTYBELIEVED IT HAD

UPSTAGED THEFAR-RIGHTISLAMIST GROUPS

THAT WERE OPPOSING IT

Countries have been grappling with the impact of climate changeand extreme events as they pose various risks to people, infra-structure, economies and future development. A significant pro-

portion of the economic losses due to extreme events is attributedto the loss and damage to infrastructure systems, thereby stressingthe need for integrating disaster and climate resilience for infrastruc-ture development. In the case of the COVID-19 pandemic, we havewitnessed an unprecedented impact on infrastructure sectors world-wide. Even though it has not led to direct damages to physical infra-structure, it led to interruptions in infrastructure services, with sig-nificant implications on economies. The outbreak is the latest reminderof the need to invest in resilient infrastructure. It exposed systemicrisks across various sectors and underlying drivers such as pover-ty, poor health systems and limited social welfare schemes that per-petuated them. The risks cut across different sectors and stronglybrought out the imperative to understand and address systemic andcascading dangers and fragilities.

As part of global recovery, infrastructure investments are beinglooked at as an indispensable part of stimulus packages aimed atrestarting economic activities. Countries are expected to invest heav-ily in infrastructure sectors as an attempt to mitigate the impacts ofthe economic fallouts as well as create employment and improvecompetitiveness simultaneously. While the health and economic impli-cations take centre stage when planning for COVID-19 recovery, theurgency of the climate emergency cannot be ignored. The pandem-ic has clearly brought out the need to focus on managing systemsrisks for strengthening resilience, a lesson one must heed, to makeheadway against climate change as well. With countries submittingtheir national climate action plans as part of the Paris Agreement,this is a crucial year for climate action as well. It is vital that the post-COVID recovery and climate action plans complement each other.

Studies show that infrastructure construction and operationsaccount for 70 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and theprovision of quality infrastructure underpins the achievement of 92per cent of targets across all Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR) alsohighlights the role of resilient infrastructure as a cornerstone for sus-tainable development. The four specific targets relate to loss reduc-tion in SFDRR, focus on cutting global disaster mortality, the num-ber of affected people, economic loss and damage to infrastructure.However, the SFDRR target on reducing damage to critical infrastruc-ture is an important prerequisite for achieving the three other targetson loss reduction. In view of this, infrastructure investments and poli-cies to bolster economies should be leveraged as an opportunity todeliver on global commitments such as the Paris Agreement on ClimateChange, SDGs and the SFDRR targets. Though some progress hasbeen made on the SDGs and the SFDRR target, the overall action tomeet them has not advanced at the required pace. The pandemichas further pushed back their progress. The COVID-19 recovery canbe utilised as an opportunity to progress on these global goals andbuild a healthy, inclusive and climate-friendly future. Investing in dis-aster and climate-resilient infrastructure can provide the much-need-ed impetus in meeting global commitments while also making con-tributions to post-COVID recovery.

(The writer is Senior Specialist for Infrastructure Resilience,Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure. The views expressedare personal.)

First, the good news. TheUS and Iran had talks inVienna on Tuesday, and

the nuclear deal they and allthe other great powers signedin 2015, is coming back.

It’s not exactly back yet.After then US PresidentDonald Trump unilaterallypulled out of the treaty in2018 and re-imposed harshsanctions on Iran, theIranians retaliated by slowlydeviating from their owncommitments under the dealone baby step at a time. Sonow there has to be an agree-ment on a timetable forunwinding those steps as wellas cancelling the US sanc-tions.

On a better run planet,the US special envoy for Iran,Rob Malloy, would justdeclare that all the US sanc-tions on Iran wrongly put inplace by the discreditedTrump Administration are

cancelled as of today. TheIranian delegation, led byDeputy Foreign MinisterAbbas Araghchi, a veteran ofthe 2015 talks, would replythat Iran will immediatelyreturn to compliance with allthe terms of the treaty andinvite UN inspectors to ver-ify that all its temporary devi-ations from treaty obliga-tions over the past three yearshave been reversed. And wewould all live happily everafter.

However, in the realworld it is not so. The nego-tiators in Vienna are not evenin the same hotel. All thecountries that are still observ-ing the treaty (China, France,Germany, Iran, Russia andthe UK) are in one hotel, andthe American mission is inanother, with messages goingback and forth between thetwo parties. Porcupines matewith less difficulty, but there

has already been someprogress.

“The United States knowsthat, in order to get back intocompliance, it’s going to haveto lift those sanctions that areinconsistent with the dealthat was reached with Iran,”said Rob Malloy. The IranianGovernment’s spokesman AliRabiei replied that he “salut-ed” Malloy’s remarks. “Wefind this position realisticand promising,” he added.

Two working groups havebeen set up that includeAmerican representatives,with the task of choreograph-ing reciprocal moves by theUS and Iran to return to thetreaty and a target of full com-pliance by both sides withintwo months. Just in time forIranian moderates to claimcredit for ending the USsanctions a week or so beforethe June election.

So that’s probably sorted,

but what about all the coun-tries that actually do havenuclear weapons? Iran orig-inally got into trouble becauseit signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in1970 and later tried to getnuclear weapons anyway, butthe countries that alreadyhad nukes when they signedthe NPT have obligations,too. How are they doing?

The NPT states that“nuclear-weapons States agreeto...pursue nuclear disarma-

ment aimed at the ultimateelimination of their nucleararsenals.” But it has been along pursuit and 50 years laternot one of them’ has actual-ly managed to catch the damnthing.

The US has got turnedaround somehow and is pur-suing in the wrong direction.It’s in the midst of a trillion-dollar-plus “upgrade” of itsnuclear forces, including anew generation of land-basedintercontinental ballistic mis-siles (ICBMs) and new sub-marine-launched cruise mis-siles.

According to PresidentVladimir Putin, Russia hasdeveloped nuclear-poweredcruise missiles and torpedoswith unlimited range, ahypersonic vehicle calledAvangard to deliver nuclearweapons at a low level andultra-high speed, and a newultra-heavy ICBM called

‘Sarmat’ that is able to carryeven more and bigger war-heads (10-15) over a longerrange (18,000 km.) Therehave also been reports of anew nuclear-powered dronetorpedo that is capable ofdelivering a 100-megatonwarhead (biggest ever testedwas 50 megatons) over arange of 10,000 km. Then itwould explode off an enemy’scoast to create a tsunamiwave 500 metres tall to inun-date the coastal regions withhighly radioactive water. Butmaybe this one is fiction.

Then there’s Little Britainwith its four submarines thatcarry nuclear-tipped missiles.Prime Minister Boris Johnsonrecently announced that hewas increasing the number ofwarheads they carry from180 to 240, but it doesn’t real-ly make much of a difference.

Traditionally the UK’sstrategy is “no first use”, which

means Britain’s retaliationwould be on cities, not onempty silos. So you’re justbouncing the rubble afterthe first few dozen warheadsexplode. That’s probably whyJohnson broke with traditionand said that Britain mightuse nuclear weapons inresponse to non-nuclearattacks, including even cyberattacks. One way to compen-sate for not really being verydangerous is to sound veryreckless.

Then there’s France(mostly harmless, despitesome 280 nuclear weapons)and China (320 but still talk-ing about expansion). PlusIndia (150), Israel (90), NorthKorea (30-40) and Pakistan(160), all countries that“unsigned” or never signedthe NPT. But at least we’re safefrom Iran’s nuclear weapons,which never existed and stilldon’t.

There are many countries that already had nukes when they signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. They have obligations, too. How are they doing?

HYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021

07

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FIRSTCOLUMN

BUILD RESILIENTINFRASTRUCTURE

This can give the impetus to meet climate commitmentswhile making contributions to post-COVID recovery

NADEEM PARACHA

POINTCOUNTERPOINT

The writer is a seniorjournalist and columnist.

The views expressed are personal.

Courtesy: Dawn

Quaking over Iran’s phantom nuclear weapons

GWYNNE DYER

Gwynne Dyer’s new bookis ‘Growing Pains: TheFuture of Democracy

(and Work)’. The views expressed

are personal.

HYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021 Money 08

MONEY MATTERS

Property consultant Anarockhas clocked an 18 per cent

growth in its revenue at Rs302 crore during the lastfiscal despite the COVID-19pandemic, its chairman AnujPuri said on Sunday. In aninterview with PTI, Puri saidthe company sold 14,700

units worth Rs 16,240 crore on behalf of the developers in the full2020-21 financial year. The numbers are higher than the 2019-20fiscal year, when Anarock sold 12,710 units worth over Rs 11,000crore. Puri pointed out that housing sales in the first four months ofthe 2019-20 were badly impacted due to the nationwide lockdown,which was imposed to control the spread of coronavirus disease.However, he said demand for residential properties improvedsignificantly thereafter. "We have achieved a revenue of Rs 302 croreduring the last fiscal," Puri said.

Anarock's FY'21 revenue up 18 per cent to Rs 302 crore

Sterling Holiday Resortsis looking to take the

total number of rooms inits inventory to 5,000 by2025 as part of robustgrowth plans goingforward, a top companyofficial said. The companycurrently has over 2,400

rooms in over 35 resorts across India, including SterlingNature Trails. "Sterling has aggressive expansion plans andaims to double its inventory from the current 2,400-plus roomsto 5,000 rooms by 2025. "In line with this, over the last oneyear, Sterling has opened resorts in Guruvayur, Thekkady andRishikesh," Sterling Holiday Resorts Chairman and MDRamesh Ramanathan told PTI.For the upcoming resorts,several locations are on active search including Mysore,Udaipur, Jodhpur, Varanasi, Coorg and Kumarakom.

Sterling Resorts to have 5Krooms in its inventory by ’25

Fitday, a nutraceutical start-up, on Sunday said it plans

to set up 50 brick-and-mortarstores across the countrywith an investment of aboutRs 60 crore. The company'sparent firm, Genomelabs,focuses mainly on product

research, formulation, manufacturing and product sales. "Fitdayplans to set up 50 brick-and-mortar stores pan-India by 2023 withan approximate investment of Rs 600 million while simultaneouslyramping up their online presence," according to a statement. Thecompany will fund the expansion through internal accruals. Fitdayfounder Suresh Raju cited reports to state that the food systems inmany countries do not offer adequate nutrient outputs to fulfill healthand nutritional needs. "Nearly half of the world's population is mal-nourished. Apparently, 840 million have insufficient intakes ofprotein/energy, and more than two billion people consume diets that areless diverse than 30 years ago, leading to deficiencies in micronutrients.

Fitday.in, a nutraceuticalstart-up, to open 50 stores

The Department ofTelecommunications (DoT)

is likely to issue guidelines onimplementation of production-linked incentive (PLI) schemesfor manufacturers in the sectorand start inviting applicationsfor the same in about a week,according to government offi-

cials. Telecom gear makers firms such as Ericsson and Nokia arekeen to expand their operations in India, and global companies likeSamsung, Cisco, Ciena and Foxconn have "shown interest" to set upmanufacturing bases in the country for telecom and networkingproducts for domestic and export markets. "Telecom PLI has alreadybeen approved by the government. The DoT is ready with guidelinesto implement it, application format, incentive allocation, etc. It shouldbe published on the DoT website within a week," the official, who didnot wish to be named, said.

DoT likely to issue guidelinesfor telecom PLI within week

PNS n NEW DELHI

The second COVID-19 wavehas postponed corporateIndia's reopening plans fornow, and distributed work-forces or hybrid working willbe the new normal as business-es seek to reduce risk andbenefit from remote working,experts said.

Corporate India's return tooffice plan is likely to be stag-gered as the pandemic willcontinue to provide challenges.In a bid to ensure continuityand productive output, compa-nies will have to provide con-venient locations, latest tech-nology and allow flexibility intandem with evolving circum-stances, they said.

"Our return to office planwill be a phased approach withnot everyone returning at thesame time," said PriyankaAnand, Vice President andHead of HR, South East Asia,Oceania & India, Ericsson.

Anand further noted that "inmy view we will see our officesevolve to a more hybrid modeof working where we will wit-

ness a build-up of an efficienthome-office infrastructure aswell as policies that flexibility& balance to the workforce".

Earlier, offices were all set toreopen but with the resur-gence of COVID-19 casesthose plans are likely to change.

"There is no official commu-nication on this yet but prob-ably work from home willcontinue. The new wave haspostponed corporate India'sreopening plans for now," saidKrishna Prasad, Head HR -APAC region, Skillsoft.

Experts believe a flexi-work-ing model is likely to be the

new norm, which would meanalternate work-from-homedays or shrunken workforcefrom offices for the next 2-3months.

"There was reopening allacross, however, depending onthe nature of the work, compa-nies may have adopted a less-er or more percentage of work-force from office or WFH. Itseems that the hybrid workingarrangements might continueup to June 2021 at least," saidLohit Bhatia, President, IndianStaffing Federation.

Bhatia further said, "Wewould request that among the

working staff, the governmentmay allow everyone above 25years of age to be vaccinatedrather than only those above 45years."

This time around companiesand employers are better pre-pared than 2020, when it wasa sudden event. Companies arenow ready with SOPs, guide-lines, testing protocols, leavesin case of testing positive orsupport towards, medical assis-tance etc, to employees.

"As the second wave is com-ing in, we are also seeingorganisations better preparedto respond to the situation bothfor their customers as well asworkforce, said Nitin Sethi,CEO, India and South Asia -Performance, Rewards &Organization Effectiveness,Aon.

In the new future of work,hybrid is a new reality that isnow strongly embedded andhere to stay, Sethi noted.

"Along with bringing in bet-ter workplace collaborationwhile working remotely, thesafety of the people has becomea priority and every organisa-

tion is willing to stay flexible asthey are regularly tracking theevolving government guide-lines and the vaccine rollout,"said Vishal Agrawal, MD, India& SAARC, Avaya.

According to Avaya's lateststudy on Life and WorkBeyond 2020, 77 per cent of theIndian employees have agreedto Hybrid work model as theyfeel it will be better for theirmental wellbeing and 74 percent of the employees havementioned that they wouldsupport government policies toembrace hybrid working, e.g.working from anywhere, office,home or other location.

"The transition back to officewill be slow and not exactlyhow we left it. The surge incases has made us rethink theback-to-work plans," saidHarsh Lambah, CountryManager India, Vice PresidentSales – South Asia, IWG plc.

A lot of companies areinvesting in COVID-19 safetytraining for employees to bringout the necessary behaviouralchanges related to health andsafety.

Partial lockdown could impactmovement of labour and goodsPNS n VIJAYAWADA

Partial lockdown measurescould impact the movement oflabour and goods which wouldaffect industrial productionsignificantly, according to aCEO's survey.

Covid curfew and microcontainment strategies alongwith Covid-appropriate behav-iour are effective to contain thespread of the second wave ofinfections, the survey by indus-try body CII suggested.

A majority of the CEOs par-ticipated in the survey indicat-ed they expect that "partiallockdown measures couldimpact the movement of labouras well as movement of goodswhich would affect industrialproduction significantly," itsaid.

More than half of the CEOspolled have stated that theirproduction could be affected ifthere are restrictions on move-ment of labour during thesepartial lockdowns.

"Similarly, 56 per cent of theCEOs expressed their concernover loss of production of up to50% if there were restrictionson the ecosystem that supportsmovement of goods," it added.

Stringent enforcement mea-sures to promote strict adher-ence to health and safety pro-tocols are essential and anymeasures to restrict social gath-

erings should not be extendedto regular functioning of indus-try and commerce, T VNarendran, President-desig-nate, CII, said.

Further to mitigate the impact

of the restrictions, about 67 percent of those polled expressedtheir desire to work with thegovernment for mass vaccina-tion of eligible workforce whoare 45 years and above.

Industrialists fear anotherexodus of migrant workersCoimbatore: With the secondwave of Covid sweeping acrossvarious parts of Tamil Nadu,some of the industrialists in theState are apprehensive ofmigrant workers leaving for theirhometowns considering thehealth conditions. The industriesrecovered from the jolt of thefirst wave of coronavirus whenover one lakh migrant workersfrom both Coimbatore andTirupur industries rushed backto their home towns in Bihar,Uttar Pradesh and Odisha by

special trains. The 30%increase in the raw materials hasaffected the indu-stries, sourcesfrom different industrialassociations said. A few workersreportedly left for their nativesearly last week as they fearedthe availability of transport liketrains to reach their towns.However, there was no majorexodus from the industries asthe workers working on weeklypayment basis had taken theirwages Saturday last, the sourcessaid.

Pension sector: Govt may hike FDI limit to 74%PNS n VIJAYAWADA

The government may hike for-eign direct investment (FDI)limit in the pension sector to74 per cent and a Bill in thisregard is expected to come inthe next Parliament session,according to sources.

Last month, Parliamentapproved a Bill to increaseFDI limit in the insurance sec-tor from 49 per cent to 74 percent. The Insurance Act, 1938was last amended in 2015which raised FDI limit to 49per cent, resulting in foreigncapital inflow of Rs 26,000crore in the last 5 years.

Amendment to PensionFund Regulatory andDevelopment Authority(PFRDA) Act, 2013 seeking toraise FDI limit in the pensionsector may come in the mon-

soon session or winter sessiondepending on variousapprovals, sources said.

Currently, the FDI in thepension fund is capped at 49per cent.

Besides, sources said, theamendment Bill may containseparation of NPS Trust fromthe PFRDA.

The powers, functions andduties of the NPS Trust, which

are currently laid down underthe PFRDA (National PensionSystem Trust) Regulations2015, may come under a char-itable trust or the CompaniesAct, they said.

The intent behind this is tokeep NPS Trust separate fromthe pension regulator andmanaged competent board of15 members. Out of this, themajority of members are like-ly to be from the governmentas they, including states, are thebiggest contributor to the cor-pus.

The PFRDA was establishedfor promoting and ensuring theorderly growth of the pensionsector with sufficient powersover pension funds, the centralrecordkeeping agency andother intermediaries. It alsosafeguards the interest of mem-bers.

The National PensionSystem (NPS) was introducedby the Government of India toreplace the defined benefitpension system. NPS was mademandatory for all new recruitsto the central government ser-vice from January 1, 2004,(except the armed forces in thefirst stage) and has also beenrolled out for all citizens witheffect from May 1, 2009, onvoluntary basis.

The government had madea conscious move to shift fromthe defined benefit, pay-as-you-go pension scheme todefined contribution pensionscheme, NPS, due to rising andunsustainable pension bill. Thetransition aimed at freeing thelimited resources of the gov-ernment for more productiveand socio-economic sectoraldevelopment.

Franklin unitholders to get Rs 2,962 cr in second tranchePNS n NEW DELHI

SBI Funds Management (SBIMF) will distribute the nexttranche of Rs 2,962 crore tounitholders of FranklinTempleton Mutual Fund's sixshuttered schemes during thecoming week.

SBI MF has already distrib-uted Rs 9,122 crore to investorsas directed by the SupremeCourt earlier.

"SBI MF would be distribut-ing the next tranche of Rs2,962 crore to unitholdersacross all six schemes.

"The payment to allinvestors whose accounts areKYC compliant with all detailsavailable will be made duringthe week of April 12, 2021," aFranklin Templeton MFspokesperson said on Sunday.

The amount to be paid tounitholders will be paid byextinguishing proportionateunits at the net asset valuedated April 9, he added.

The payment will be madeelectronically to all eligibleunitholders by SBI MF, which

has been appointed as the liq-uidator for the schemes underwinding up by the SupremeCourt.

In case the unitholders' bankaccount is not eligible for anelectronic payment, a chequeor demand draft will be issuedand sent to their registeredaddress by SBI MF.

In March, the SupremeCourt accepted the standardoperating procedure (SOP)finalised by SBI MF to mone-tise assets and distribute theproceeds to unitholders of thesix debt schemes of FranklinTempleton Mutual Fund.

Franklin Templeton MFshut its six debt mutual fundschemes in April 2020 citingredemption pressures and lackof liquidity in the bond mar-ket.

The schemes were FranklinIndia Low Duration Fund,Franklin India DynamicAccrual Fund, Franklin IndiaCredit Risk Fund, FranklinIndia Short Term Income Plan,Franklin India Ultra ShortBond Fund, and Franklin IndiaIncome Opportunities Fund.They together had an estimat-ed Rs 25,000 crore as assetsunder management (AUM).

Samsung aims toincrease market sharePNS n NEW DELHI

South Korean consumer elec-tronics major Samsung isbanking on its Indian innova-tion-powered, artificial intel-ligence-enabled washingmachines range to becomethe number one player in thefully automatic segment inIndia this year, according to asenior company official.

The company is looking toincrease its market share in thefully automatic washingmachines segment to 32 percent this year from 24.6 percent at present in the catego-ry, which accounts for about60 per cent of the total estimat-ed 90 lakh units per annumwashing machines market inIndia.

Samsung India had recent-ly launched a new line-up offully automatic front loadwashing machines which are

artificial intelligence (AI)enabled with bi-lingual userinterface in Hindi and English.

"Our ambition is to go fromthe number two position tonumber one position, from a24.6 per cent share to a 32 percent share in fully automatic(segment) within this year2021," Samsung India SeniorVice President, ConsumerElectronics Business, RajuPullan told PTI.

At present, rival LG occu-pies the top slot in the fullyautomatic washing machinessegment.

"With the 32 per cent (mar-ket share) objective we have setfor ourself, we will be theNumber 1 brand," he asserted,adding the company willachieve it though distinctiveproduct and product differen-tiation and reliance on Indianinnovation and the made forIndia range.

Amid Covid,RSH deferscapex plansPNS n NEW DELHI

Personal care products makerRSH Global has deferred itscapex plans until early nextyear due to the COVID-19pandemic and is now plan-ning to set up a new manu-facturing plant in HimachalPradesh in a phase-wise man-ner at a cost of Rs 100 crore.

"Due to COVID-19 situa-tion, we put our capex planon hold for setting up ourthird manufacturing plant...Entire new plant project costis Rs 100 crore... Early nextyear, construction will startfor setting up the plant. Wewill do it in phases. It is ahuge facility," Sunil Agarwal,chairman of RSH Global,told PTI.

At present, RSH Global hastwo manufacturing plants inBaddi in Himachal Pradesh.

PNS n NEW DELHI

Eyeing indigenous productionof containers amid a globalsurge in demand, the Centre islooking to develop Bhavnagarin Gujarat as a container huband has set up pilot projects forits manufacturing, UnionMinister Mansukh Mandaviyasaid.

The initiative aimed atattaining self-reliance in con-tainer production eyes Rs1,000 crore investment fromprivate players and looks tocreate one lakh jobs.

The move assumes signifi-cance amid reports of globalshortages of containers withIndian containerised trade tak-ing a hit owing to the staggered

supply and demand shocksacross geographies as per logis-tic majors.

"India requires about 3.5lakh containers every year....There is no container pro-duction in India and we haveto depend mainly on Chinawhich is a global producer.Now we want to developBhavnagar in Gujarat as a

container hub and we haveselected 10 places there for itsproduction on a pilot basis,"Ports, Shipping and WaterwaysMinister Mansukh Mandaviyatold PTI.

The pilot project has beensuccessful, he said.

Mandaviya said the Ministryof shipping during the last sixmonths has taken several ini-tiatives to encourage contain-er production at Bhavnagarwith the help of re-rolling andfurnace makers who are beingencouraged to diversify in thespace.

"We expect private players toinvest about Rs 1,000 crore inthis space. We also expect cre-ation of one lakh local jobs,"the minister said.

‘India to manufacture containers,eyes Rs 1,000 crore investment’

Power consumptiongrows 47% in AprilPNS n NEW DELHI

Power consumption in thecountry grew nearly 47 percent in the first week of Aprilto 28.34 billion units (BU) overthe corresponding period ayear ago, showing robustrecovery in industrial andcommercial demand of elec-tricity, according to powerministry data. Power con-sumption in the first week ofApril last year was was record-ed at 19.33 BU.

On the other hand, thepeak power demand met,which is the highest supply ina day, during first week thismonth remained well abovethe highest record of 132.20GW in the same period inApril 2020.

During the first week thismonth, peak power demandtouched the highest level of181.05 GW on April 7, 2021,and recorded a growth of 27per cent over 132.20 GWrecorded in the entire monthof April last year.

Power consumption inApril last year had dropped to84.55 BU from 110.11 BU insame month in 2019. Thishappened mainly because offewer economic activities fol-lowing imposition of lock-down by the government.

Similarly, peak powerdemand met also slumped to132.20 GW in April last yearfrom 176.81GW in the samemonth in 2019, showing theimpact of lockdown on eco-nomic activities.

EV policy needsto be rejigged tomake it moreeffective: HeroPNS n NEW DELHI

The country's electric vehicle(EV) policy needs to be"rejigged" and requires"course correction" in orderto make it more effective toachieve envisaged sales tar-gets, according to the coun-try's leading electric two-wheeler maker Hero Electric.

Under the FAME-IIscheme, which was launchedin April 2019, the plan was toput at least 10 lakh high-speed electric two-wheelerson the road by March 2022.

"We are now two years downin the policy and there is onlyone year to go. But if you lookat the number of vehicles whichhave benefitted, it is just around60,000 units. It should have beensix lakh plus by now. So some-thing is not working. So that iswhere the policy now needs tobe kind of rejigged," HeroElectric Managing DirectorNaveen Munjal told PTI.

Under the second phase ofthe Faster Adoption andManufacturing of ElectricVehicles in India (FAME-II)scheme, 10 lakh registered elec-tric two-wheelers with a maxi-mum ex-factory price are eligi-ble to avail incentive of Rs20,000 each.

Currently, only high-speedelectric two-wheelers qualifyfor incentives under the FAME-II scheme.

Second wave puts off reopeningof firms; transition to be slow

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MondayApril 12, 2021

We know the British loved ourspices centuries ago, but today,

we have people from acrossthe globe who are looking

forward to fusing their disheswith Indian kitchen

ingredients. Meet Britishnational Sarah Todd, a

celebrated chef, who talks toThe Pioneer's SHIKHA

DUGGAL about her obsessionwith south Indian curries, herdream project, the restaurantsshe wishes to start, and more.

hen Sarah Todd wasgrowing up, she foundher love for food andfound that food waslove! This Brit is socrazy about south

Indian curry, that it regularly getsvoted within the top five mostpopular meals of hers.

“I admire chefs who can satiatea diner’s appetite whilst alsoinspiring the home cook to feelthat they can make enticingmeals at home on a budget. Noteveryone can afford a Michelinstar meal, so I believe that creat-ing something yourself at home isjust as important. Food is an inte-gral part of everyone’s life. In say-ing this, Gordan Ramsay inspiresme! His success is unparalleled,his passion and love for the hos-pitality industry are undeniable.His broad appeal across all sec-tors of the industry inspires us tobe better cooks. I aspire to reachhis level, however, minus theexpletives,” adds the Australianchef who first appeared on theAustralian food scene in 2014 asone of that season’s most popularMasterChef Australia contestants.

She became curious aboutwhat she calls ‘Indian-flavouredfood with aromatic spices’ and inanticipation of the same, usherson a book called ‘My IndianKitchen’ taking you beyond thewell-known restaurant favouritesof butter chicken, chicken tan-doori, and dal with classicalFrench techniques!

She says, “When I say inspiredwith a touch of Asian, I meanthat Indian touch. So, there are alot of spices and marinades thatwe can make use of usingAustralian techniques such asgrilling and barbecuing as well asclassical French techniques. Thisis a style of cooking that I devel-oped over time. It showcases pro-duce while loading it with theincredible flavours of India. Myspiced lamb rack with a fresh fen-nel salad can be considered mysignature dish as family celebra-

tions in Australia always involvea barbecue so I use this techniquein some of my recipes. Thesmoky goodness of grilled foodover charcoal is familiar to bothAustralia and India but theflavours are all inspired by India.”

With a rustic, simple, andhomestyle bursting with flavours,the model-turned-chef ’s go-to

meal is south Indian curry! Thisrich curry is one of herfavourites, and you will oftensmell the aroma wafting from herkitchen. Its creamy, coconutflavour resonates with everyone’spalate. It goes with almost every-thing from prawns and fish toroast pumpkin. Sarah bringingthe old and the new, the tradi-

tional and the modern learningto live side by side carrying thearoma of her land serving a mixof classic French fare — she epit-omises her belief that eating welland looking your best are possi-ble when you use loads of freshherbs, aromatic spices, and beau-tiful ingredients to create foodthat is healthy, yet bursting withflavour. “I was trained in classicalFrench cuisine which taught methe techniques of cooking but inIndia, I learnt how to add theheart and soul to a dish! I knowthat sounds cliché but cookingfrom the heart really is the key tomaking incredible food. My newbook is inspired by my experi-ences across India which com-pletely changed my perception ofIndian cuisine. The Indian disheswe are familiar with in Australiasuch as ‘butter chicken’ and ‘dalmakhani’ are not designed to beeaten on a regular basis. I wasoverwhelmed by the diverse andwholesome food cooked everyday in Indian homes. The recipesin my cookbook, although notauthentic, are a representation ofhow fresh and light Indian cui-sine can be,” she ushers.

With new arrivals, it’s time towelcome a novel drift across theF&B landscape!

Indian culinary scene isextremely vibrant at present witha lot of innovations and fusions

coming into play. With Indianssettled abroad in various parts ofthe world, Indian cuisine hasreally gone global and is wellaccepted too, but who could havewondered that somebody perma-nently situated abroad will pickup on food trends happening inIndia! Sarah further gives detailsand tells us, “Through inclusionand diversity, the food scene isevolving. We are seeing Indianchefs preparing French food,Australian chefs mastering Indianfood, and everything in between.We are borrowing techniques andflavours. An individual’s cookingstyle is inspired by appreciatingand respecting different culturesand cuisines. Having said that, Ihave started working on the con-cept for my next restaurant andfeel that it would be perfectlyplaced in the thriving, bustlingmetropolis of Delhi! I have nothad a lot of time over the lasttwelve months to take the firststep, but the vision is very clear.So, watch this space! My goalwith this cookbook is to takeIndian cuisine around the world;I’d also like to do the samethrough restaurants.”

This is Indian-French fusioncooking, a highly personalexpression that at first sniffs,seems very exotic and beyond theken of home cooks, but it's thearoma that gets you hooked!

LOVE AFFAIR!THE FRENCH-INDIAN W

he world is chang-ing. And clearly, atthis crucial turn-ing point of ourplanet, three mostimportant things

are: Awakening, understand-ing and changing. Giving us

a deeper understanding ofnature and our place withinit, Sony BCC Earth bringsthe Age of Nature. The showis a fresh look at our relation-ship with nature and how weare beginning to restore thebalance of life on earth.Excerpts:

What does the showAge of Nature try toconvey to the audi-ence?

Well, we wanted people tounderstand a few fundamen-tal things about nature. Oneis that we’re utterly depen-dent on it, whether you livein the countryside of yourfarm or in a city, and youdrink water, breathe air, we’reall as a human species utterlydependent on it. And thatnature is in a bit of trouble atthe moment. I think that’snot new for anybody. Butwe’re almost at a tippingpoint where if we don’t startto pay more attention andlook after nature better, we’regoing to find ourselves livingon a very uncomfortableplanet. The most importantthing is it’s not that difficultto help nature heal itself. Thepower of it is extraordinary.All we need to do is give it alittle bit of space, make sure ithas what it needs and naturewill heal itself quickly.

What are some of theways we can restoreour planet?

I think giving space tonature is the most importantthing we can do. It will bal-ance itself and take care ofitself. Nature changes all thetime and that’s fine. But wejust need to sort of leave it toget on with it. So if you giveit an empty field, it will veryquickly reseed that field withplants and then the pollina-tors will come and the birdswill come in and very quicklythat empty field will be full oflife again. So I think just togive it some space, take awayour chemicals, our intensivefarming practices, unsustain-able building practices, andlet nature do what it wants todo.

How are the conceptsof awakening, under-standing and changingexplained in the show?

For us as filmmakers, weneeded to go back in time toexplain how we’ve got to thepoint where we are today.And it hasn’t taken very longin the great history of theworld where humans haveonly been distressing naturefor relatively a couple of 100years in an intensive way. Soyou can see the journey ofwhat’s happened there, what

we’ve been doing and theeffect. But also what we cansee is that we do already treatnature in some ways, muchbetter than we did 50 yearsago. And that’s because ourunderstanding of nature is somuch better now. And that’swhat you can see in EpisodeTwo. The science that we cando now is incredible. Weunderstand how ocean cur-rents work, how the atmos-phere protects our planet,how biodiversity is, so it’ssort of complicated andinterconnected. We didn’tknow these things 50 yearsago, but we know them now.That means that we canknow better how to look afterthem. Going forward into thefuture with climate change,this is obviously the greatestchallenge that humanity hasever faced. But nature can bea huge part of helping uscope with that because naturesequesters carbon. It’s thecheapest, easiest, most obvi-ous way to help us reducesome of the carbon in theatmosphere, which is some-thing we need to do urgently.

Can you explain theimportance of balanceof nature, and howhumans impact it?

Balance of nature is quitean interesting term. I think

nature is far from balance. Itis wild, dynamic, moving andchanging all the time. It’s nat-ural to have fires and floods.It adapts quickly to all thechanges that happen acrossthe planet. And if you’relooking over a largertimescale and a larger space,then it all balances out. Butwe’re not expecting nature tobe still and to be calm. Whatnature needs to have is theability to make these changesbecause that’s what it’s alwaysdone. And that’s what itneeds more space for. So Ithink, to get us to get the bal-ance with nature right we justneed to give nature morespace.

What are some of theincredible things youlearned about natureduring the making ofthe show?

Well, I learned the term.For me, the biggest revelationwas the term ‘nature’s abilityto store carbon forests’. Itstores that carbon with thestrength of its biodiversity. Soit’s not just planting trees,which as you know, a usefultechnical pump to pump thecarbon down. But the storageneeds to happen in the soil, itneeds to happen under thewater in the oceans. That canonly happen if ecosystems

are healthy and biodiversity— rich and strong. When wedestroy nature, when wetrawl the ocean floor withouthuge fishing trawlers, whenwe burn forests, when weplough, we admit as muchcarbon as burning fossilfuels. That was somethingthat I didn’t know earlier. Theother, probably the mostinteresting shoot I did wasgoing to film the ranches livewith wolves around theYellowstone National Parkover in North America, andhow they’ve learned to copeliving with wolves, howthey’re learning to acceptpredators back into theecosystem and how we couldlearn from their journey andapply it to other places in theworld where wolves are beingtolerated, once again, across

Europe, for example.

What really drove youto this profession —wildlife filmmaking?

Well, I’ve been into naturesince I was a child. I’vealways spent a lot of timeobserving, collecting bugs,bringing them home, muchto my mother’s horror. Itmust be genetic because it’sbeen with me for a very longtime. Also, I really enjoy sto-rytelling — the technicalaspect of filmmaking doesn’tinterest me so much, it’s sim-ply telling of stories. So tobring those two passionstogether, I entered into theworld of wildlife filmmaking.And I feel, one cannot makewildlife or nature-inspiredfilms without realising thatthere’s a bigger story to tell,

and that our nature is in a bitof trouble. We simply need topay more attention to it,especially now.

Any message you havefor the Indian audi-ence?

Yes, I think there’s a lot ofhope out there, and the nar-rative of climate change isfrightening. It’s depressing.But there’s hope in natureand everybody can play theirpart, be it a small windowbox in a city or a back gardenin a rural area or when you’refarming. Nature will be grate-ful for everything, even if youdo your minutest bit. It willsurely repay you one day bymaking a healthy planet forus to live on.

(The show premieres todayat 9 pm on Sony BBC Earth.)

There is hopeFilmmaker

and seriesproducer of

Age ofNature, Verity

White, talksto The

Pioneer abouta fresh look at

ourrelationship

with Nature,our impact on

it, how itworks and

how we canbegin to

restore thebalance of life

on earth.

hether working fromhome or office, toilingaway for long hourswithout breaks andphysical activity canbegin to damage your

body, vitality and even withouttell-tale signs.

“It is important to achieve ahelthy work-life balance inorder to live a fulfilled life. Butthere are moments in life whenyou have to finish certain dead-lines and cannot avoid spend-ing a lot of time on your desk,”says Beenu Rajpoot, noted film-maker and a Fit IndiaChampion.

The fitness expert lists a fewsuggestions for those busyhours that will not only nourishyour body and mind, but alsoincrease overall productivity.Keep the following in mind:¬Between emails, meetingsand calls, try to take a strolleven for a few minutes to resetyour body and brain. A little bitof movement during those longsitting hours will go a long wayto ensure that your body andjoints do not become too stiffby sitting.¬Check your breath duringintervals. Take a few longbreaths engaging your abdomi-nals to ensure that your body isgetting enough oxygen. Learnsome pranayama techniques torecreate yourself quickly so thatyou can maintain a constantenergy level throughout thelong span of desk sitting.¬Remember to do a fewneck and shoulder stretcheswhile on your desk to avoidneck pain or back pain later. Itwill also help in keeping yourposture upright. Add usefulstretches from your yoga classto these intervals.¬Choose the appropriateergonomic chair and table inorder to maintain a good pos-ture while sitting for long

hours. Some of the importantfactors to be considered are --shape of the chair, height of thechair, height of the table, lum-bar support in the chair, amongothers. Ensure that your chairhas some kind of lumbar sup-port. Lumbar support will pro-tect your lumbar spine frompressures of excessive flexionduring long sitting hours. It isalso important to choose a chairwhere you can adjust the heightof the chair so that you canadjust its height vis-a-vis yourtable. It will be good for yourmid-upper back and shoulders.Often people who ignore thisadvice can develop health con-ditions like scoliosis and round-ed shoulders.¬Keep drinking water dur-ing a long shift. It's quite com-mon that people under pressurekeep suppressing their thirstsubconsciously that makesthem dehydrated. Remember tokeep sipping the water everyhour or so to keep your bodyrich in fluids that will improvethe circulation and will keepyour blood pressure in check,apart from many other benefitsof drinking water.¬Ensure that you are gettingsome sun during the day. It willnot only enrich your Vitamin Dlevels but also give a big boostto your immune system. It isvery common among the bigcities in India that people don'tget enough Vitamin D as theyare not exposed to the sunlightoften. Lack of exposure to thesunlight leads to Vitamin Ddeficiency that is often linked toother health issues.¬Give your eyes some rest inbetween after every half anhour or so by doing a simpleyoga technique of palming. Rubyour palms together and justcover your eyes with your warmpalms. Your eyes will feel ener-gised immediately.

Working long hours?

Keep your body,

mind active

W

t

Rules

ARCHIE

GARFIELD

SUDOKU

REALITY CHECK SPEED BUMP CROSSWORD

GINGER MEGGS

NANCY

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

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

Yesterday’s solution

CALVIN AND HOBBES

FUN

PARTY

10

Hyderabad Monday April 12 2021what’s brewing?

l B Sumathi

l Nikita

l Niharika Reddy

SILK SSMITTEN

Fashion designer Niharika Reddy's newventure, Shree Vaidiki Silks wasinaugurated by Women Safety Wing

DIG B.Sumathi. Music director Dr DeviShree Guruji, Actor Raghu Kunche, Filmartist Josh Ravi, and film critic MaheshKathi were present at the glittery event atRoad no 71, Film Nagar, Hyderabad.

l Manasa

l Vyshnavi

l Prashanti

l Renuka

l Priya

Photos by SV Chary

f the ongoing buzz in themedia and the film indus-try are to be believed,Mass Maharaja Ravi Tejais all set to work withTamil director Sarath

Mandava of Ko 2 fame, for a project.Idiot fame actor Ravi Teja seems tobe on a signing spree. He is current-ly working on Khiladi and he willsoon be shifting his focus onto RT68which will be directed by TrinadhaRao Nakkina of Nenu Local and

Cinema Choopistha Maava fame.The upcoming film is touted to be

an action thriller and is bankrolledby Sudhakar Cherukuri.

Ravi Teja and Sarath Mandava’sfilm is expected to go on the floorsvery soon.

Sarath Mandava, who’d made the2016 film, Ko 2, in Tamil, hadapparently come up with an authen-tic story that demands high octaneaction sequences that suit MassMaharaja Ravi Teja, given the latter’s

apparent love for working inaction movies. Reports have beencoming in that Ravi Teja, who wasvery impressed, has given his greensignal to Sarath.

On the other side, Ravi Teja waslast seen playing the role of a pow-erful police officer in action dramaKrack in which he shared the screenspace with Gabbar Singh and VakeelSaab fame Shruti Haasan.

Currently he is playing a dual rolein Khiladi.

11

Hyderabad Monday April 12 2021 tollywood

he much-awaitedteaser of AdiviSesh-starrer Majorwill be launchedtoday. Bollywood,Tollywood and

Mollywood’s superstars —Salman Khan, Mahesh Babuand Prithviraj Sukumaran —will launch the teaser inHindi, Telugu, andMalayalam respectively.

Major is a biopic based onthe life of Major SandeepUnnikrishnan, who lost hislife in the 26/11 terrorist

attacks in Mumbai. Directedby Sashi Kiran Tikka, thefilm is to release on July 2.The teaser is expected tooffer insight into the differ-ent phases of Major’s life.

Earlier, the teaser of Majorwas supposed to be releasedin Mumbai on March 28.However, due to the rise inthe number of Covid-19cases in the city and thepassing away of directorSashi Kiran Tikka’s fatherSuryanarayana, the teaserlaunch in Mumbai had to be

postponed. “Wanted to do anational event for thisnational film in Mumbai in abig way. Slight change ofplans :) Will keep you updat-ed. Eppudu occhaam anadhikaadhuannaya...Bullet....(well youget the idea) Reporting soon!#MajorTheFilm (sic),” AdiviShesh and team Major issuedthe statement on socialmedia.

Major stars SaieeManjrekar, SobhitaDhulipala, Prakash Raj,

Revathi and Murli Sharma.The film is produced bySony Pictures Films India inassociation with MaheshBabu’s GMB Entertainmentand A+S movies.

Recently, a new poster ofthe film Major was launched.Adivi Sesh introducedSobhita Dhulipala’s characterwith the new poster. AdiviSesh took to his social mediahandles to introduce thecharacter of SobhitaDhulipala in the film -Pramoda. Taking to Twitter,

he wrote, “Introducing anew dimension in the#PeopleOfMajor. TheTerrorists came into thehotel. Then they came forher. She fought back.@sobhitaD IS. PRAMODA(sic).”

Sobhita Dhulipala alsoshared her look from thefilm. She summed up hercharacter with this shortnote, “I am Pramoda in#MajorTheFilm. I think ofher as a lion-hearted lullaby(sic).”

SALMAN, MAHESH, PRITHVIRAJ’S

inger and composer VishalMishra of Kaise Hua and Aaj Bhifame, was a law student when hejust decided to give it all awayand pursue his dreams ofbecoming a singer. He is known

for his work in few Hindi movies such asMunna Michael, Saand Ki Aankh, Pranaam,Qarib Qarib Singlle, Kabir Singh, JabariyaJodi, Notebook, and Race 3 etc. Now VishalMishra is on the board for SS Rajamouli’supcoming much hyped big budget dramaRRR.

The young Bollywood musician, singerand songwriter took to Twitter and shareda picture of himself posing with SSRajamouli and music composer Keeravaniand wrote, “We made magic today at the stu-dio. RRR coming soon.” With the post,Vishal Mishra confirmed that the music ses-sions of RRR are underway and in full swing.

The period drama RRR narrates a ficti-tious tale based on the life of Telugu free-dom fighters, Alluri Seetharama Raju andKomaram Bheem. It has Jr NTR and RamCharan in the lead rolex and it is being pro-duced at an estimated budget of Rs 450 croreby DVV Danayya.

RRR is slated to arrive at the theaters onOctober 13 worldwide.

Vishal Mishra is on board RRR

n the wake of JanaSena chief PawanKalyan’s personalstaff confirmingnews of contractingcoronavirus, the

actor-turned-politician wentinto isolation. Jana Sena partyhas issued a statement sayingthat Pawan went into homeisolation on the advice of doc-tors as some of the personalstaff were diagnosed withCovid.

“Jana Sena president PawanKalyan’s chief executive, securi-ty personnel and most of thepersonal staff have been affect-ed by corona. As a precaution-ary measure he went into thehome quarantine with a doc-tor’s prescription,” the state-ment reads.

It is reported that over thepast week, many in his

entourage, who perform dutiesvery close to him, have beensuffering from Covid. As a pre-cautionary measure, he wentinto home quarantine as partof a Corona dilatation preven-tion. Meanwhile, Pawan Kalyancampaigned for the BJP candi-date in Tirupati last week.Pawan participated in a publicmeeting there. Many peoplefrom BJP and Jana Sena partic-ipated in this meeting. Theyare all concerned ever sincenews of Pawan’s staff contract-ing the virus has come out.

On the other hand, Dil Raju,the producer of the film VakeelSaab, the actor’s recent film,said that Pawan had stronglysuggested that the audiencecoming to watch the actor'sfilm, wear masks, maintainsocial distance and sanitisethemselves.

Pawan Kalyan isolates self aspersonal staff test positive for Covid

T

S

e was born and brought up in Hyderabadand dreamt of seeing himself on the bigscreens some day. He has been around inthe industry for nine years now, but itwas only in 2019 that he became a famil-iar face with his performance as Moeen

in Gully Boy. The spotlight has never left Vijay Varma since

then, and the actor now asserts he wants to have a

long career in Bollywood.The actor of Middle Class

Abbayi fame, ventured intoBollywood in 2012 withChittagong, and his first big breakwas in 2016, where he sharedscreen space with AmitabhBachchan in Pink. He was thenseen in films such as Gully Boy,Yaara and Bamfaad. He was a talk-ing point with his performance in the web-seriesMirzapur 2 as well as his recent released show OKComputer.

Talking about Bollywood being a brutal place thatdefines success through hits and misses, Vijay sayshis fears are different.

“I don’t know. I know that the audience suddenlystarts to lose interest in certain actors and I couldnever figure out what could be the reason, but it isone of the deepest fears — One of the fears I wouldhave is not to be accepted by the audience,” Vijaytold a news agency.

That’s not his only fear, though. “The secondbiggest fear will be to lose your capability as anactor. You’re no longer able to do something sur-prising or invent a character or to do something thatfascinates people. These are the fears every artistelives with, and they therefore try to push themselvesharder and reinvent themselves time and again,” hesaid.

The 37-year-old does not want to stop early. “Iwould want to have a long career. Would want to tella lot many stories through a lot many characters…Best way to go about this is by keeping my head onthe shoulder and feet on the ground and workinghard, smart and taking risks,” he signed off.

he upcoming film ThankYou marks the second col-laboration betweenAkkineni Naga Chaitanyaand Vikram Kumar afterManam. Currently, the

shoot of Thank You is going on inHyderabad at brisk pace.

The latest we hear is that, later inApril, Naga Chaitanya and the team

of Thank You will be flying to Italy tocomplete its last leg of shooting. In thefilm, Chay will be seen as a Mahesh

Babu fan, which also is said to havea sports backdrop, a la his previous

film Majili. Naga Chaitanya-starrer Thank

You has three actresses, whileRaashi Khanna is playing the

female lead, MalavikaNair and AvikaGor have pivotalroles.

Vikram KKumar’s direc-torial ventureThank You isbeing backed byDil Raju and it is

slated to hit the the-aters by the end of this

year. On the otherside, NagaChaitanya will also be seen play-ing the lead role in Love Story,helmed by Sekhar Kammula,that has Sai Pallavi of Fida famepaired opposite him.

BOOST TO MAJOR

THANKYOU

TEAMTO FLY

TOITALY

T

T

I

I

City star Vijay doesnot want to stop

Ravi Teja’s next with Tamil director?

PTI n MUMBAI

Another battle of big-hitters is on the cardswhen KL Rahul’s Punjab Kings take on the

Sanju Samson-led Rajasthan Royals, two line-ups dotted with expansive stroke-makers and inpursuit of a winning start to their IPL campaignshere on Monday.

Rajasthan will be banking heavilyon their swashbuckling all-rounderBen Stokes. Stokes willbe keen to get someruns under his beltand so will be the likesof Englishman JosButtler and newly-appointed skipperSamson, who is amine-field of tal-ent.

The Royalscould opt to openwith the highly-rated YashasviJaiswal andButtler. WhileSamson, who would be itching toprove a point, and Stokes wouldthen form strong middle-order.

If the four fire on allcylinders, they can pum-mel any attack into sub-mission and Punjabwould be no exceptionon the Wankhede track,which is usually batting-friendly.

Royals also have anseveral other options attheir disposal, includingall-rounders Shivam Dube,Shreyas Gopal, RahulTewatia, Riyan Parag and LiamLivingstone.

Gopal, Tewatia and Parag, allbowl leg-spin, so it would be inter-esting to see whether the Royals optto go in with two leg-spinners.

Tewatia and Dube have the abil-ity to whack the ball outside the park

and look to be certainties in the playing XI.With star pacer Jofra Archer missing due

to injury, the pace attack will have to be ledby Rajasthan's newest recruit — South Africanall-rounder Chris Morris, who will be eagerto justify his huge price tag of Rs 16.25 crore.

RR will have to get their combination rightas only four foreigners can make the playingXI.

So, it will be interesting to see whetherRoyals opt for left-arm pacer MustafizurRahman or go in with either JaydevUnadkat, Kartik Tyagi or Chetan Sakariya.

Unadkat, with his experience, mightget the nod.

On the other hand, Punjab boast ofsome hard-hitters like Rahul (670 runs in

2020 season), Mayank Agarwal (424 runs)and Chris Gayle.

Rahul and Agarwal formed a lethal open-ing combination in 2020 and would continueto open.

They also have the likes of EnglishmanDawid Malan, one of the finest T20 batsmencurrently, hard-hitting Tamil Nadu batsman MShahrukh Khan, and West Indian Nicholos

Pooran.For them too, it would be all about getting

the combination right.Shahrukh could get the nod ahead of oth-

ers like Deepak Hooda and Sarfaraz Khan, andcould play the role of a finisher.

12IT WAS SPECIAL FOR ME CAPTAINING INIPL AND WALKING OUT FOR TOSS WITHMS. I HAVE LEARNT FROM HIM AND HE'S

MY GO-TO MAN— RISHABH PANT

CAPTAIN’S CALLHYDERABAD | MONDAY | APRIL 12, 2021

VS

Matches 21Rajasthan RRoyals 12Punjab KKings 9

LAST YEAR’S MATCHES

Rajasthan Royals defeated

Punjab Kings by 4 wickets at

Sharjah

Rajasthan Royals beat Punjab

Kings by 7 wicketa at Abu

Dhabi

VENUE: WANKHEDE STADIUM, MUMBAI

Punjab Kings Skipper Lokesh

Rahul who scored 1922 runs at

an average of 54.91 in 42 innings

of as many matches ,needs 78

runs to become only second

batsman after Shaun Marsh

(2477 runs) to score over 2000

runs for Punjab Kings in IPL.

1922

KEY PLAYERS

PLAYER RUNS

1. Shikhar Dhawan (DC) 85

2. Nitish Rana (KKR) 80

3. Prithvi Shaw (DC) 72

PLAYER WKTS

1. Harshal Patel (RCB) 5

2. Avesh Khan (DC) 2

3. Chris Woakes (DC) 2

MOST SIXES

1. Nitish Rana (KKR) 4

2. Suresh Raina (CSK) 4

3. Chris Lynn (MI) 3

SUMMER SLAM

MOTION PICTURE

BEN STOKES

English all-rounder will have an

extra responsibility with the ball

this time in absence of Archer.

CHRIS GAYLE

He will be the X-factor in Kings

line-up. Gayle's power hitting

can take PBKS to big total.

HEAD TO HEAD

TODATODALIVE FROM

7:30PM IST

STAR SSPORTS 11 NNETWORK

David Warner's daughters Indi Rae, Isla Rose and Ivy Mae getready to cheer for Sunrisers Hyderabad @davidwarner31

Big-hitters galoreDHONI FINED FOR SLOW OVER RATEChennai Super Kings skipper Mahendra Singh Dhonihas been fined `12 lakh for maintaining a slow overrate during his side's IPL opener against DC here.“Chennai Super Kings captain MS Dhoni has beenfined after his team maintained a slow over-rateduring their IPL 2021 match against Delhi Capitals atWankhede Stadium, Mumbai on April 10,” the IPLsaid in a media statement.”As it was his team's firstoffence of the season under the IPL's Code ofConduct relating to minimum over-rate offences, MrDhoni was fined ` 12 lakh,” the statement added.

LOSING HAZELEWOOD A BLOW Chennai Super Kings head coach Stephen Flemingsaid losing Josh Hazelwood was a big blow ahead ofthe new season's start as it left the team without theoverseas pace bowling options with his replacementJason Behrendorff and South African Lungi Ngidi stillnot available for team's next game said. Australiapacer Hazelwood had withdrawn at the last momentto keep himself fit for upcoming internationalassignments. Behrendorff was named hisreplacement last Friday and is yet to arrive, whileNgidi is serving his quarantine after returning midwayfrom South Africa's ODI series against Pakistan.

PTI nMUMBAI

Star pacer Jofra Archer’sabsence because of injury is

a “big blow” to Rajasthan Royalsbut their new Director of CricketKumar Sangakkara is confidentthat the team’s young Indian fastbowlers will rise to the challengein this year's Indian PremierLeague.

Archer, who played with ahand injury during the Indiaseries, is currently recuperatingfrom a surgery and the durationof his availability during the laterpart is still not clear.

“Sanju and I will both agreethat it’s a big blow for us. Jofrais a very vital part of our make-up and not to have him isunfortunately the reality of it. Wehave to work around it and plancontingencies,” Sangakkara toldPTI during a virtual press con-ference on Sunday ahead of theclash against Punjab Kings hereon Monday.

The former Sri Lankan cap-tain is, however, hopeful thatArcher will be available at somepoint and "play his part in theIPL.”

The weak link for Royals,over the years, has been theirIndian pace attack where themost experienced name JaydevUnadkat hasn’t exactly set thestage on fire.

Apart from Unadkat, theyhave his left-arm back-up

Chetan Sakariya and theimmensely talented KartikTyagi.

"Inexperience can probablywork for you and it could meanthat opposition hasn't seen youeither. Fast bowling in IPL is notan easy task and we saw that yes-

terday (Delhi Capitals vsChennai Super Kings) as well,”said Sangakkara, who has playeda number of seasons in the IPL.

"Most of the wickets aregood for batting. So, you have tobe quite skilful. We have KartikTyagi, who did pretty well lastseason in patches and this yearwe have new additions (pacer)Kuldeep Yadav (Jr) and ChetanSakariya,” he stated.

For Sangakkara, it is imper-ative that these youngsters areprepared to understand matchsituations and bowl according-ly.

“It’s about keeping themfocussed on what their job is andget them trained and preparedto execute different deliveries,scenarios and match plans forthe opposition but at the sametime, giving them confidenceabout their own strengths.”

The Royals skipper SanjuSamson has gone slightly off theradar as far as the national teamis concerned after having failedto grab even a single opportuni-ty. However, Sangakkara believesthat both the captain and RahulTewatia, who recently was in

India squad for the T20 seriesagainst England, could benational team regulars if theycan trust their abilities a bitmore.

“Pressure is always there.Whether it is Sanju or Rahul,reality is they will tell you thatexpectations and pressures willalways be there. Everyone hasvarious coping mechanisms todeal with it, focus is to stay in themoment,” he said.

“It is very important to havethose grand ambitions of play-ing regular international crick-et, and both Sanju and Rahul arevery capable of not just beingregulars but great, outstandingperformers at the internationalstage.”

The eloquent former gloves-man wants each of his 11 play-ers to be “problem solvers”, whocan think on their feet and helpthe skipper.

“...That really helps the skip-per Sanju a lot on the field whenpeople are thinking themselvesas to what’s going on (match sit-uation), and it also builds a lotof trust within the unit,” headded.

PTI n MUMBAI

Delhi Capitals experiencedopener Shikhar Dhawan was

mighty impressed with RishabhPant’s leadership qualities, sayingthe youngster led the team in acalm and composed manner in hisfirst match as captain and will onlyget better with time.

Pant was thrust into captaincyafter regular skipper Shreyas Iyersustained a shoulder injury duringthe recent ODI series againstEngland and was ruled out of thetournament.

The 23-year-old wicketkeeper-batsman made a memorable startto his captaincy stint as he led DCto a convincing seven-wicket winover three-time championsChennai Super Kings in theiropening match of the IPL 2021 hereon Saturday.

“He (Rishabh Pant) did quitewell. First of all, glad that he wonthe toss. It was a bit of a sticky wick-et, so it was good for us to bat sec-

ond. He kept his calm and kept onmotivating the boys,” Dhawan saidduring the post-match press con-ference.

“He made good changes aswell. It was his first match (as cap-tain), so I am sure it is only goingto get refined from here. He has just

started and with experience, I amsure, he is only going to get better.

“The best thing about RishabhPant is that he stays calm. His pres-ence of mind is quite there, whichis very very good.”

Asked if he gives his advice toPant as a senior player, Dhawansaid: “...Of course, I give my adviceto him. The youngsters, wheneverthey come to me to ask for battingtips or mindset things, I alwaysshare my knowledge with them.”

Dhawan smashed a 54-ball 85studded with 10 fours and twomaximums and alongwith PrithviShaw (72) shared a 138-run open-ing stand as Delhi chased down189 with eight balls to spare.

Asked about his sweep shotsagainst the pacers, Dhawan said:"I started practising it at the netsand then introduced it in thegame. We have to play accordingto the field set. I knew Chennaikeeps square leg and fine leginside the 30-yard circle and keepcovers behind for me.

RR, Punjab Kings aim forwinning start to IPL campaign

Dhawan impressed by Pant’scalmness on captaincy debut

Missing Jofra is big blow: Sangakkara

Chennai Super Kings' Suresh Raina spends time in kitchen @chennaiIPL

PTI n CHENNAI

Opener Nitish Rana (80)and Rahul Tripathi (53) hitfluent half-centuries to

propel Kolkata Knight Riders toa challenging 187 for six againstSunrisers Hyderabad in theirIndian Premier League match,here on Sunday.

SRH’s Rashid Khan (2/24)was yet again at his best, askingtough questions to the batsmenbut most of his bowling col-leagues proved ineffective on abatting-friendly wicket.

Dinesh Karthik (22 not out off9 balls) provided a late flourish toKKR innings but they could gath-er only 42 runs in the last fiveovers.

Left-handed opener Ranastruck the ball hard and clean toprovide his side a confident startafter they were asked to take firststrike.

His strokes on the off-side —

the drives and cuts - were of high-est quality and a treat to the eye.

Neither Bhuvneshwar Kumarnor T Natarajan could stop Ranafrom hitting boundaries even asSubhman Gill was quiet initially.Sandeep Sharma was hit for threeboundaries in a row by him.

Gill opened up his arms to hita massive straight six off Natarajanto make it even better for KKR.

However, the run-flow wasaffected when ever-reliable Rashidgot the ball in his hands. He also

provided the breakthrough whenhe deceived Gill with a wrong’unto find the stumps.

Rana though kept goingstrong, completing his half-centu-ry with a six off Vijay Shankar aftersurviving an LBW appeal offRashid. He got the decision over-turned, taking the DRS call. Rana’ssix-hitting continued after gettinghis fifty as he punished Natarajanand Sandeep again.

His colleague at the other endRahul Tripathi also stroked con-fidently and fluently. He smasheda massive six off Bhuvneshwar andthen followed it up with a cheekyfour in the third-man region.

He completed his fifty withanother boundary offBhuvneshwar but was dismissedby Natarajan soon after when hetop-edged a ball. Rashid too sentback dangerous Andre Russell (5)back.

Mohammed Nabi (2/32) gotrid of Rana and Eoin Morgan (2)off successive balls in the 18th

Rana,Tripathi power KKR to 187

NITISH RANA LASTSIX INNINGS IN IPLRuns Balls Opposition

team

0 1 RR

81 53 DC

0 1 KXIP

87 61 CSK

0 1 RCB

80 56 SRH

Picture credits: IPLT20.com

Picture credits: IPLT20.com

Picture credits: IPLT20.com

Picture credits: @rajasthanroyals