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he Union Cabinet on
Wednesday approved the
amendments to the Insurance
Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2008,
hours after a Select Committee
headed by BJP MP Chandan
Mitra tabled its report in the
Rajya Sabha.
The Select Committee has
given the go-ahead to the
Government to increase the
composite foreign equity
investment cap from the 26 per
cent at present to 49 per cent
for the benefit of the Indian
insurance sector. However, this
cap should be inclusive of all
forms of Foreign Direct
Investment (FDI) and foreign
portfolio investments.
After the Cabinet, headed
by Prime Minister Narendra
Modi, approved incorporation
of amendments suggested by
the Parliamentary select panel,
the Rajya Sabha is likely to take
up the Bill for consideration
and passage early next week.
The panel expressed that
incremental equity should ideally
be used for expansion of capital
base to strengthen the insurance
sector. Besides, it also suggested
measures to protect policy holders, having penalty for insurance
companies commensurate with
their offence, having a Securities
Appellate Tribunal.
The panel report, however,
contains dissent notes from
four members, P Rajeev (CPIM), Derek OBrien (TMC),
Ram Gopal Yadav (SP) and KC

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Tyagi (JD-U).
As per estimates by
Insurance Regulatory and
Development Authority (IRDA)
the additional capital requirement of the insurance sector
would be C55,000 crores
(C44,500-crore for the life sector and C10,500-crore for nonlife sector) over the next five
years, which the domestic
industry may not be able to
cater. As of now, the 26 per cent
cap has limited the capital
inflow to C25,000-crore in the
life sector. Out of this, C6,000crore is foreign capital. In fact,
the total FDI in insurance sector as of now is hardly one per
cent of the total FDI coming to
India and at present a very small
percentage of the population is
covered by life insurance.
This will bring in much

needed capital in the insurance

sector. The competition will
naturally help in improvement
of services to policy holders
and increase in products, said
Chandan Mitra.
The committee deliberated
at length on safeguards with
regard to Indian ownership
and control and felt that there
was hardly any difference
between FDI limits at 26 per
cent and 49 per cent on this
issue. It said the term control
must be defined in the Act itself
and should include the right to
appoint a majority of directors
or to control management or
policy decisions including
by virtue of their shareholding/management rights/
shareholders agreements or
voting agreements.
Continued on Page 4

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he BJP Government, which

T
is celebrating Atal Bihari
Vajpayees 90th birthday on
December 25 as Good
Governance Day across the
country, may confer on him
this years Bharat Ratna award,
the highest civilian honour of
the nation, in recognition of his
stupendous and all round
contribution to the nation.
According to sources, the
Government may bestow
Bharat Ratna on January 26, the
Republic Day.
The issue was raised in the
BJP Parliamentary Party meeting on Tuesday when BJP MPs

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sought the award for the partys
ailing patriarch. The BJP had
already announced that it would
confer the nations highest civilian award on Vajpayee if it is catapulted to power at the Centre.

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When contacted by The

Pioneer, Parliamentary Affairs
Minister Venkaiah Naidu
refused to comment on the
speculation. He said, All I can
say is that I would meet

Vajpayeeji on December 24
before proceeding to Bangalore
and Vishakhapattanam to mark
Good Governance Day on
Ataljis birthday.
However, some BJP and
Shiv Sena MPs strongly supported the idea of honouring
Vajpayee. Senior BJP leader and
MP from Kanpur Murli
Manohar Joshi said, Nobody
deserves the Bharat Ratna more
than Atal Bihari Vajpayeeji.
Mathura MP and former
Bollywood actress Hema
Malini too supported the
demand, stating, He has done
so much great work, and we as
party members feel very honoured and happy if it is given
to Atal Bihari Vajpayeeji.
Shiv Sena leader Anant
Geete, a Minister in the Modi
Government, said that his party
wants Bharat Ratna for the former Prime Minister.
Continued on Page 4

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ndias Kailash Satyarthi

IPrize
received the Nobel Peace
for 2014 on Wednesday,
sharing it with Pakistans Malala
Yousafzai, the youngest ever
Nobel laureate, for their work
on promoting child rights in the
sub-continent. Satyarthi and
Yousafzai are precisely the people whom Alfred Nobel in his
will calls champions of peace,
Chairman of the Norwegian
Nobel Committee Thorbjorn
Jagland said in his speech before
awarding them the prize.
Satyarthi, 60, who gave up
his job as an electrical engineer
to run an NGO for rescuing
children from forced labour
and trafficking, and 17-year-old
Malala, who survived a nearfatal Taliban attack two years
ago with determination advocating education for girls, were
named by the Nobel Peace
Prize Committee for the prestigious award on October 10.
They received the Nobel
medal which is 18 carat green
gold plated with 24 carat gold
and weighs around 175 grams.
They will share $1.1 million
prize money.
Satyarthis NGO Bachpan
Bachao Andolan prides itself
on liberating over 80,000 children from bonded labour in
factories and workshops across

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India. According to the
International
Labour
Organisation (ILO) there are
about 168 million child labourers globally. There are roughly 60 million child labourers in
India alone.

Speaking after receiving

the award, Satyarthi started
off his speech by reciting a
mantra from the Vedas.
However, he lost a page of his
speech and wondered whether
this had happened before to

0?

any other Nobel laureate.

Solutions are not found only
in the deliberations in conferences and prescriptions from a
distance...Friends what is missing now of course is my
(speech) paper, he said amid
peals of laughter in the Oslo
City Hall where he received the
coveted prize.
But, no problem, I will
continue without that, the 60year-old said, quickly regaining
composure.
Continued on Page 4

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=4F34;78

eye of a storm over a

IfirmnrapetheUber
case, global cab-booking
on Wednesday finally ceased its operations in the
National Capital complying
with a Government ban
imposed on it. The Delhi Police
had expressed its inability to
enforce ban on Uber operation.
The Delhi Government on
Monday had announced a ban
on Uber and other app-based
taxi services with immediate
effect after the rape of a 27year-old woman executive by a
cabbie contracted by the firm.
Even though Delhi
Government had imposed the
ban with immediate effect,
Uber continued with its services till Tuesday evening,
claiming that it had not
received any communication
about the action.
Police said the Delhi
Governments order banning
the cab company in the city was
hand delivered to its officials on
Tuesday evening after they
claimed that the order was yet
to reach them.
The move to cease operations came even as the STA and
Traffic Police engaged in a
blame game with both putting

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the onus on each other to

enforce the ban.
The Delhi Traffic Police
expressed its inability to ban
Uber cabs plying in the
National Capital. Their contention was that banning the

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taxi service was not under their

domain as Uber Cab Service is
operated by a especiallydesigned app and Delhi Traffic
Police does not have data of the
taxis enrolled with Uber.
Continued on Page 4

?=BQ =4F34;78

ictims of abortive suiV

cide bids will not be subjected to criminal trial as the
Centre has decided to scrap
Section 309 from the Indian
Penal Code (IPC) that makes
attempt to commit suicide a
punishable offence with a
maximum of one-year imprisonment and fine.
In a written reply to the
Rajya Sabha to a question on
the progress made on a Law
Commission report that proposed decriminalising IPC
Section 309, Minister of
State for Home Haribhai
Parathibhai Chaudhary
informed the Upper House
that 18 States and four Union
Territories approved the 210th
report of the Law Commission
paving way for effacing out the
controversial provision from
the statute book.
Eighteen States and four
Union Territory administrations have supported that
Section 309 of the IPC may be
deleted. Keeping in view the
responses from the States/
UTs, it has been decided to
delete Section 309 of IPC
from the statute book.
Continued on Page 4

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he Kashmir willow is
T
famous across the world.
Cricketers and tourists who
visit Kashmir Valley always
take a memento in the form of
cricketing bats back home.
Cricketing legend Sachin
Tendulkar is also known to
have started his cricketing journey with Kashmir willow, presented to him by his sister.
But it is only this time in a
league match of Ranji Trophy
that the State, bestowed with
greener pastures, exhibited its
cricketing talents outside the
9P\\d:PbW\XaRaXRZTccTP\RT[TQaPcTPUcTaSTUTPcX]V#cX\TRWP\_X^]<d\QPXX]PAP]YXCa^_Wh6a^d_0\PcRWPccWT
State. On Wednesday, the
FP]ZWTSTBcPSXd\X]<d\QPX^]FTS]TbSPh
?C8 young eleven from Jammu &

Kashmir scripted a new chapter in the glorious history of

Ranji Trophy by handing over
a crushing defeat to 40-time
champion Mumbai in the
sprawling greens of Wankhede
stadium in the first match
within Group A.
Chasing a modest target of
237 and commencing at their
overnight 58 for one, J&K kept
composure despite losing five
more wickets to reach the target 73 minutes after lunch on
the fourth and final day.
Team coach Sunil Joshi
said for the first time in the last
20 years, he saw Mumbai batsmen showing vulnerability
against pace bowling.
Coach Joshi ascribed the
victory to team effort. We
did well in the one-day tournament (held before Ranji
Trophy). Our bowling is good.
We need to work some more
on our batting. Playing away

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from home will give the team

more exposure, he added.
Former Ranji Trophy player Ajay Gupta told The Pioneer,
There is no dearth of talents
in Jammu & Kashmir. We
lacked training facilities and
exposure to quality pitches. He
said ever since our boys have
started playing cricket under
the captaincy of Parvez Rasool,
they have been doing wonders.
Ajay added, Many bright
careers were spoiled during
peak militancy days due to lack
of training facilities and infrastructural support.

According to him, a
promising cricketer from
Jammu, Mithun Manhas, who
showed some class in the
domestic cricket, migrated to
Delhi in 1997-98 and made it
big in the IPL tournaments.
For the first time in 1983,
cricket enthusiasts had witnessed cricket carnival in
Kashmir Valley. Indian team
had then played against West
Indies in the Sher-e-Kashmir
Cricket stadium. During peak
of militancy, no one returned
to the cricketing field in a professional manner for a long
time. The cricketing field was
utilised for all other purposes
but for the game.
The local talents got a
makeover in the aftermath of
2010 unrest in the Kashmir
Valley when Jammu & Kashmir
Cricket Association for the
first time joined hands with the
Indian Army and organised

Kashmir Premiere League. The

tournament created a separate
space for the players who were
committed and sponsored new
cricket clubs to promote the
sporting activity in the Valley
and Jammu region.
The first break came when
Parvez Rasool, an off spinner
from Bijbehara in Anantnag
district made it to the Indian
team last year and inspired
new generation of cricketers to
bat for themselves and face
bouncing tracks with renewed
confidence. He was followed by
another young talent, Shubham
Khajuria. On Wednesday,
Khajuria played a crucial role in
the team victory. He partnered
his teammate Ian Singh to
come closer to the victory target. Parvez too chipped in with
his bat not allowing the
Mumbai pacers to breach the
wall of defence.
RANJI RELATED: P15

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A094B7:D<0AQ =4F34;78

he National Green
Tribunal (NGT) has
T
directed the Delhi Transport
Corporation (DTC) to run
buses of different sizes since
most of its air-conditioned
buses are plying empty on
Delhi roads. The tribunal has
also directed to impose
compensation (apart from the
penalty under violation of
Acts) and the amount may be
determined by it on the
principle of polluter pays for
causing and abating pollution
in the national Capital.
The Tribunals order
followed the reports that DTC
AC buses normally remain
empty even during the peak
hours. It is common
knowledge that DTC AC buses
are run for long part of the day
but without passengers. Thus,
DTC should run buses of
different capacities and sizes at

different timings and on

different routes. All such buses
would be driven on CNG fuel
only, said Justice Swatanter
Kumar in an order related to
pollution in the national Capital.
Currently, the DTC has
over 625 AC buses in its fleet.
According to the order,
The DTC should ensure that
its buses do not cause
congestion. This transport
system should be of greater
utility to the public and distinct

incentives should be provided

to the general public to
encourage the use of public
transport. Every DTC bus is
subjected to monthly
mechanical check-up and
bimonthly PUC test.
Notably, a report by the
Urban Development Ministry
at the Centre has found that the
availability of public transport
(buses and Metro) in Delhi per
1,000 people is a shocking
0.504. Worse, the average

waiting time for all 517 DTC

bus routes is 70 minutes,
probably because of the less
frequent bus trips in sparsely
populated undeveloped areas.
Out of total 6,455 buses in
Delhi, only 2,202 (i.e. 34%) are
according to urban bus
specifications, says the report.
Despite a spiraling population
and road network, it has 5,100
buses - owned and operated by
DTC - plying on 517 routes.
The average waiting time

83TUS\Y^Ucd_bUdQY^`_Y^dcicdU]
BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

n a setback to the Department

of Education (DoE), the Delhi
IHigh
Court on Wednesday has
refused to grant interim stay on
its single-judge verdict quashing
the point-system for nursery
admissions brought in by the
Lieutenant-Governor for private
unaided schools here. A Bench
of Chief Justice G Rohini and
Justice RS Endlaw dismissed the
application for interim stay,
moved by the Education
department of the Delhi
Government, saying it will hear
the main appeal on merit on
January 15. The application is
dismissed, the Bench said.
The courts order came on
a plea moved by senior
advocate PP Malhotra,
appearing for the Delhi
Governments DoE, contending
that there cannot be any

The judge erred to hold

discrimination or question of
autonomy in the matter of that if parents are given freedom
admitting children around to choose the school, then good
three years of age in nursery. schools would attract more
It may be recalled that the students and would expand and
order was passed by a single not-so-good schools would lose
judge on November 28 who also students, the petition had said.
disposed off two petitions by a The judge has failed to consider
committee and a forum that education is a paramount
representing the private schools consideration for the welfare of
which had challenged the L- the society and in this, there are
s e v e r a l
Gs December
18
and =DAB4AH03<8BB8>=B participants.
Q u ash
December 27,
2013 notifications by which the and set aside the impugned
points system was introduced. judgement dated November 28
The application by the DoE had with all consequential benefits
contended that the single judge and reliefs, the government
order was totally wrong, had pleaded to the court. Under
erroneous and against the the earlier system, out of a total
law and did not appreciate the 100 points, 70 were given if the
correct legal position and scheme child lives in the neighbourhood
of Article 21 (Protection of Life of the school, additional 20
and Personal Liberty) and Article were given if a sibling is studying
21-A (Right to Education) of the there, five points more if either
parent is an alumni and another
Constitution.

five points if it is an inter-state

transfer case. Draw of lots were
held at each point level.
Thereafter, the Government
had on February 27 issued an
order abolishing the five points
that were being awarded in
inter-state transfer cases.
The single judge, while
quashing point system, had said
the private unaided schools
have the fundamental right to
maximum autonomy in day-today administration, including
right to admit students. The
court had also said that children
should have the option to go to
a neighbourhood school, but
their choice cannot be restricted
to a school in their locality.
This court is unable to
appreciate that a students
educational fate can be
relegated to his position on a
map, Justice Manmohan said
in his 69-page judgement.

B?[TPSTabW^cX]6iQ
B?B8=67Q 670I80103

leader of the Samajwadi

Party and former councillor
A
of Ghaziabad Municipal
Corporation was shot dead on
Wednesday morning by armed
assailants in the Vasundhara
colony of Indirapuram.
According to police,
preliminary investigations
revealed that the killing was an
outcome of gang rivalry as SP
leader Pradeep Chaudhary, alias
TT, (35) was a history-sheeter.
Chaudhary a resident of
Sahibabad had left his home
around 8 am and was parking his

bike outside Dronacharya Gym

at 2C Vasundhara when three
bike-borne assailants suddenly
opened fire and fled the spot.
According to police, four shots
were fired from very close range
out of which three bullets hit the
councillor in head and chest.
Chaudhary died on the spot.
The deceaseds brother,
Praveen, lodged an FIR against
Mahender Phelwan and
Narender Noodal and one
unidentified youth at
Indirapuram police station.
Apparently, there was a
prolonged dispute involving
an 80 square metre plot in

Rajendra Nagar Industrial area.

A criminal case has been
registered against the accused.
Raids have been conducted to
nab them but the criminals are
at large, said Hardayal Singh
Yadav Inspector Indirapuram
police station.
Chaudhary had been a
member of different political
parties and was currently an
active member of the
Samajwadi Party. His wife had
also been the councillor with
the municipal corporation. He
was also involved in property
dealing and vegetable trading
in Sahibabad area.

=^]R^\\d]XRPQ[T
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BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

on-communicable diseases (NCDs) mainly

cardiovascular, respiratory, diabetes, mental
N
disorders and cancer have been identified as a
major challenge to health, economic growth and
national development.
In India, mortality due to NCDs was
estimated at 5.9 million, accounting for 60 per
cent of deaths in 2012. The NCD burden is
already undermining social and economic
development, which is likely to increase over
the next two decades. If concerted measures
are not taken, NCDs will cost India
approximately $3.5 trillion between 2012 and
2030, in terms of lost economic output, said
Dr Nata Menabde.
While globalisation, urbanisation, rapid
economic growth and population ageing are
major drivers behind the NCD epidemic, most
of the premature deaths from NCDs are
linked to common mistakes like tobacco,
alcohol, unhealthy diet and physical inactivity
that can be prevented by promoting healthy
public policies and strengthening the health
system, she added.

8UR^]RTacTS\TPbdaTbPaT]^c
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4B>1D1=5>1245

for public transport users, as

calculated from the scheduled
headways (measurement of the
distance or time between
vehicles in a transit system) of
DTC bus routes is 70 minutes,
says the report, explaining that
the waiting time is high because
it takes into account the
headways of all routes, including
those which serve sparsely
populated undeveloped areas
with less frequent bus services.
The total route length of all the
657 routes registered with State
Transport Authority is 16,200
km, including suburban and
overlapping routes. However,
the suburban routes are very less
and have a negligible
contribution to the overall route
length, notes the report.
The tribunal has also
directed that those who violate
its directions besides being
liable for different actions that
may be taken against them by
the corporation or appropriate
authority under the law in
force would also be liable to
pay compensation and the
amounts may be determined
by the tribunal on the principle
of polluter pays for causing
and or abating pollution in
NCR Delhi.

6XaaXX]PdVdaPcTb"aS
6^ecbRW^^[X]>ZW[P
BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

ember of Parliament of
East Delhi parliamentary
M
constituency Maheish Girri on
Wednesday inaugurated a Senior
Secondary Government School
in Madanpur Khadar, Okhla.
This is the third school
that has started under my
tenure. All this is an attempt of
developing Okhla that has
remained to be one of the least
developed zones. Under the
general public interest initiatives
like development of the longdelayed Sarita Vihar underpass
has been taken up. For this, I
have been pursuing the matter
with the L-G to ensure speedy
completion, said Girri. In the
last two months, Girri had laid
foundation stone of two more
schools in Okhla Madanpur
Khadar and another in JJ
Colony.

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n order to decongest Delhi

roads, the Ministry of Road
ITransport
and Highways
(MoRTH) has asked the Delhi
Government to deposit its
pending share of about
C1,141.28 crore towards the
land acquisitions for the
Eastern and Western Express
Peripheral Expressways. On
the other hand, Delhi
Lieutenant-Governor Najeeb
Jung has urged the Centre to
cap the share as per the project
cost as on 2010.
In a letter to Jung, Union
Minister for Road Transport
and Highways Nitin Gadkari
stated that if there was any
increase in the cost, it would be
appropriated among the
Governments of Delhi, UP
and Haryana in the proportion
of 50 per cent, 25 per cent and
25 per cent respectively.
The letter said, The LA
(land acquisition) cost for these
projects have gone up from
initial C844.00 crore to
C3,589.56 crore due to
arbitration awards over which
the Union and State
Governments have no control.
Accordingly, the share of the
Government of NCT of Delhi
works out to C1,794.78 crore,
out of which C653.50 crore has
already been deposited and
C1,141.28 crore is still pending.
The Minister said that
both the Har yana State
Industrial and Infrastructure
Development Corporation
(HSIIDC) and the National
Highways Authority of India
(NHAI) were making efforts
at their end for land
acquisition as well as
achieving progress of the two
projects. He said that the
EPE was now proposed to be
taken up on the Engineering
Procurement Construction
(EPC) mode and the project
would be soon on the ground.

He said that the land

acquisition was crucial for the
star t
and
successful
completion of the project.
The letter said, With
regard to the request for
capping the cost of land
acquisition, it may be
appreciated that the cost of land
acquisition is difficult to be
firmed up as the cost keeps on
varying till the final amount of
compensation is awarded by
the competent authority for
land acquisition (CALA) and
arbitrators etc In view of
above circumstances, I request
you to take urgent action to
deposit the pending share of Rs

1,141.28 crore of Government

of NCT of Delhi, towards land
acquisition for the above
projects.
It is noted that the
Lieutenant-Governor has stated
that the Delhi Government
has already contributed Rs
653.50 crore for the project till
now. The Delhi Government
has already exceeded its share
as per the original cost-sharing
formula, which had fixed Rs
422 crore as the share of the
Delhi Government. Apparently,
the cost of land acquisition has
been revised several times
taking the shares of Delhi from
C422 crore to C1,794.78 crore.

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The two expressways

each about 135 km long
were planned in 2006
following a Supreme Court
order to form a Ring Road
outside the city for channeling
non-Delhi bound traffic
bypassing the national Capital.
The Eastern Peripheral
Expressway (EPE) envisages
providing signal free
connectivity
between
Ghaziabad,
Faridabad,
Gautam Budh Nagar (Greater
Noida) and Palwal.
The Western Peripheral
Expressway (WPE) will be
connecting Kundli to Palwal
via Manesar in Haryana. The
Centre has already set a
deadline of three years to
complete the expressways,
which aim to decongest the
city roads.

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BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

elhi University (DU) has

constituted a sevenD
member committee to propose
changes in the universitys
examination system with a
view to implementing the
choice- based credit scheme. It
may be noted that the
University Grants Commission
(UGC) had recently written to
all universities directing them
to implement a scheme that
allows students seamless
mobility across higher
education institutions and bring
in a uniform grading system.
The DU Vice-Chancellor
has constituted a seven-member
committee to give its
recommendations on the
implementation of the choicebased credit system, Joint
Registrar (Academics) Ram
Dutt said.
The committee, which
includes Dutt, will be headed by
Sunil Sodhi, Principal of
Maharaja Agrasen College.
Other members of the panel are
P Hemlatha Reddy, Principal of
Sri Venketeswara College, Manoj
Sinha, the Aryabhatta College

Principal, Manoj Saxena of the

Department of Economics at
Deen Dayal Upadhyay College,
AK Baghi from the Department
of Chemistry at Dyal Singh
College and Virender Bhardwaj
of the Department of Hindi at
Shivaji College.
The committee will draft
a discussion paper on key
issues such as revision required
in the curriculum, examination
and assessment systems and
ensuring of credit equivalence,
said Dutt. It will also deliberate
upon the grading pattern,
process of setting question
papers, accountability of
evaluators, credits for each
subject or paper and guidelines
for credit transfer, he added.
The panel is supposed to
submit its report by next month
following which the varsitys
Executive Council and
Academic Council will take a
call on its recommendations
and decide the final course of
action. As per the directive
from Union HRD Minister
Smriti Irani, the credit-based
choice system will be
implemented in the next
academic session.

BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

he Aam Aadmi Party

(AAP) on Wednesday
T
named former Prime Minister
Lal Bahadur Shastris grandson
Adarsh Shastri as its candidate
from Dwarka constituency for
the upcoming Delhi Assembly
polls. The party in its third
list has given tickets to
mostly fresh faces.
Adarsh had unsuccessfully
contested the Lok Sabha
election on an AAP ticket
from Allahabad. He was
formerly employed with Apple
Inc. With 10 candidates in the
third list, the AAP has so far
announced 45 candidates for
the 70-seat Assembly.
The fledgling party is yet to
announce the candidature of its
convener Arvind Kejriwal, who
was a legislator from New
Delhi constituency in the last
Assembly. The other nine
candidates who are mostly
first-timers include Rituraj Jha
from Kirari, Praveen Kumar
from Jangpura, Nitin Tyagi
from Laxmi Nagar, SK Bagga
from Krishna Nagar, Charan
Goyal from Moti Nagar, Sahi

Ram from Tuglakabad, Kartar

Singh Tanwar from Chattarpur,
Ved Prakash from Bawana and
Sharad Chauhan from Narela.
Former Ministers Manish
Sisodia and Rakhi Birla figured
in partys second list which had
13 more candidates for the
upcoming Delhi Assembly
elections. Sisodia will contest
from Patparganj and Birla has
been fielded from Mangolpuri,
seats represented by the two
former Ministers in their earlier
stint as legislators. AAPs national
convener Arvind Kejriwals name
will be, reportedly, announced at
the end as partys chief
ministerial candidate.
In the first list of 22
candidates, announced on
November 13, the party
announced tickets to12 of its
former legislators, which
included four former ministers
of the 49-day AAP Government.

\Tca^bcPcX^]baT]P\TS
BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

he Delhi Government has

changed the names of 10
T
Metro stations, including seven
proposed stations under its
third phase of construction.
The move comes after the
recommendations of a
committee constituted by the
Government for renaming of
Metro stations.
According to the Transport
department, the names of three
existing Metro stations
Tughlakabad, Badarpur and
Okhla have been changed
and they will now be known as
Tughlakabad Railway Station,
Badarpur Border, Harkesh
Nagar Okhla stations,

respectively. Meanwhile, a
senior Government official
stated, The names of seven

other proposed Metro stations,

which are being built under
Phase III, have been changed.

The official also said that

the proposed Metro station at
Shalimar Place will be known as
Badli More, while the Municipal
Corporation station will be
known as Najafgarh. Besides,
Najafgarh Depot Station will be
known as Nangli and the name
of Ghevra has been changed to
Ghevra Metro station.
Proposed Metro station
Moti Bagh, which is also being
built under Phase III, will be
known as Sir Vishweshwaraiah
Moti Bagh. The name of Okhla
(Phase III) station has been
changed to Okhla NIC. Apart
from that the proposed South
Campus station will be known
as Durgabai Deshmukh South
Campus, he added.

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B0:B78270=3Q =4F34;78

he rape accused in the

Uber case, Shiv Kumar
Yadav, is man obsessed with
sex. Delhi Police officials
involved in the interrogation of
the accused are flabbergasted as
the he has been reeling off lurid
details of his sexual fantasies.
During the investigation,
he confessed that he opted to
work late and did not return
home. Instead, he stood outside
pubs and malls to target vulnerable women.
The three-day police custody remand of Yadav will end
on Thursday. The police are
unlikely to seek further custodial remand. During Yadavs
three-day remand, he was
questioned at length by the
police officers.
Probe has revealed that
the accused was a lecher who
was all the time looking for
prey. He even offered women
waiting for transport during
nights to drop them home in
lieu of sexual favours.
Yadav had also approached
a counsel during his stay in
Mathura and was well versed
with the interrogation system
and the answers he would have
to give to the police officers.
Yadav has been working as
a taxi driver for the last eight
years and had also bought a
Swift Dzire through bank loan.
When he was questioned by the
officers, he tried to mislead the
police by saying that it was consensual and that the girl was
demanding a heavy sum.
However, he broke down
and confessed to the crime and
said that he thought the girl was
sleeping and would not report
the incident but the moment he
received a text from the victim
stating that she was raped
which the victim was sending
to someone else, he realised
that he was in trouble.
Yadav told interrogators
that from the time he was an
adolescent he always dreamt
and fantasised about sex, so
much so that he watched
pornography on a regular basis.
Sources revealed that he

he Delhi Police on Wednesday

evening questioned Asia
T
Pacific Head of Uber Eric

Alexander at the office of the

Deputy Commissioner of Police
(North). He was questioned for
over two hours during which he
told the police about their organisational structure.
Alexander was also questioned
on Tuesday night after he arrived
in the Capital from Hong Kong.
He was summoned by the police
under Section 91 of the CrPc. Eric
reached along with general manager (Marketing) Gagan Bhatia.
The police officials are yet to
decide on who faces the liability
for the negligence on part of
Uber. The Delhi Police gave a 12point questionnaire to them asking for replies on certain points.
The Asia Pacific head was ques-

?C8

30A:2
2>=54BB8>=B

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always fantasised about women
and worked as a cab driver with
various call centres in Delhi
and NCR just to satiate his lust
by watching beautiful women
every day and later visualised
them. He also told the police
officers that he hardly went
home and remained looking
out for girls late night on the
streets of Delhi. He offered a
ride back home to women and
girls who did not have money.
He would take them to an isolated zone and demand sexual
favours from them in return.
He claimed that he had forced
women a lot of times to engage

in sexual activities with him.

Interrogation of the
accused further revealed that
he was a sex maniac and would
look out for preys every day.
Police officials first tried to join
the dots and figured that he
had raped a woman in 2011 in
Delhi. Then another case in
2013 was reported in Uttar
Pradesh and also womenfolk in
his village always feared to
come out knowing his lecherous behaviour. In that case, it
was not possible that he had
not hunted for a prey from
2011-2013 and then from
2013-2014.

he Delhi Police has recovT

ered the iPhone which was
provided by Uber to the driver
accused of raping the 27-yearold finance company executive
on Friday night. The smartphone was recovered from
Mathura by a Delhi Police
team, which had gone there
with the accused, Shiv Kumar
Yadav, on Tuesday in search of
the phone. The phone was
recovered at his instance from
his wife in Mathura. Police have
already recovered two of the
three phones used by Yadav.
Uber provided its cab drivers iPhones with the application installed on it. Customers
have to book a cab through the
companys websites. The system
then sends a message to the driver of a cab nearest to the customer and when he accepts the
assignment, his name, photo
and other details of the cab like
its registration number is sent to
the customer through this App.
The phone is an important
evidence for us. It will prove
that Yadav works for Uber
which will help us prove the

culpability of the cab service. It

will also prove that Yadav was
driving the cab which the victim has booked, said a senior
police official. Its GPS signature
will help us corroborate the
route from where she was
picked, the course the cab took
to reach the spot where the
crime took place and when he
dropped the victim near her
home, he said. The accused driver had dropped a message in
the companys system that the
customer has been dropped and
then exited the app. He had
then fled to Mathura.
Police also questioned the
two friends of Yadav. However,
the police did not find any
criminal record of the two and
any culpability on the duo in
the case. The duo, identified as
Gaurav and Kamal, are friends
of 32-year-old Shiv Kumar
Yadav, who used to drive Swift
Dzire cab at times. Yadav had
also procured the SIM card on
Gauravs identity card. The
police officials are also looking
out for the tout who Yadav had
paid Rs 5000 to get a fake character certificate made for an All
India Tourist permit.

BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

he Delhi Police has

approached the US-based
woman to file a complaint for
the alleged indecent behaviour of Shiv Kumar Yadav, the
accused in the Uber rape case,
on November 26 when she had
taken his cab during her India
visit. The police also urged people to come forward if they
have any complaint against the
accused driver of any kind.
Nidhi Shah, who was in
India for a week in November,
has in a series of tweets on
Tuesday said that during her trip
in his cab, Yadav had stared at
her through the rear view mirror and smiled in a weird way.
Police contacted her on Twitter
and said that she can lodge complaint with them in this connection. However, till late
evening, she has not responded
to the tweet. @nps2113 If you
wish to lodge a police complaint
against Shiv Kmr Yadav for his
indecent act please feel free to
contact us, a senior official said
in a tweet to Shah.
He also said that she can
file a complaint through email
if she wants.

BC055A4?>AC4AQ
=4F34;78

he State BJP unit on

Wednesday urged the
T
Centre that the Delhi
Government should start night
taxi service for the women.
The party suggested that bookings for the same could be
done through a women
helpline by utilising Nirbhaya
fund established this year.
Delhi BJP president Satish
Upadhyay, general secretary
Rekha Gupta and spokesperson Poonam Azad have
requested for an exclusive cab
service for women from 9 pm
to 6 am.
Besides, the Delhi cadre
has also formed a committee
consisting of party vice-presidents Rajni Abbi, Shikha Rai,
Vishakha Shailani and Mahila
Morcha President Kamaljeet
Sehrawat for taking suggestions on the security of women
and ensuring implementation
by the Delhi Police and the
Government. The Committee
will hear the bad experience of

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Shah had also said that she

had made a complaint to Uber
about this behaviour of their
driver. They said via email they
would check on him. Not soon
enough, she said in a tweet.
There has been massive uproar
on the internet over the issue
since the incident. The Delhi
Police has already filed an FIR
against Uber charging it with
cheating its customers and defying Government orders, has
been questioning senior Uber
officials for the last three days.
The company was banned from
operating in the city by Delhi
Government on Monday. Shiv
Kumar Yadav, who was driving
the Uber cab, had allegedly
raped the woman on Friday
night when the victim, who
works for a finance company in
Gurgaon, was headed back to
her home in north Delhis
Inderlok area.

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womens rights body has

called for regulating operA
ations of mobile applicationbased taxi services in the country in the wake of alleged rape
of a 27-year-old finance executive by an Uber cab driver.
This incident not only
reminds us of the harrowing
Nirbhaya case but also tells us
clearly that womens safety is an
issue that gets compromised
time and again, fails to get
addressed in a decisive manner
it needs to be and is still far
from being a priority for any
government in power, said
Indira Jaising, Executive
Director of Lawyers Collective
Womens Rights Initiative.
We are disappointed to
see the attitude of Government
and internal disagreements
on how to deal with foreign

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corporations like Uber, who
are not only flouting norms
but take refuge in the fine print
that the drivers conduct and in
this criminal offence is not the
responsibility of the company,
said Jaising, also a senior
advocate in the Supreme
Court of India.
She was speaking at the
launch of two legal resource
books in Hindi titled, Locating
the survivor in the Indian

Criminal Justice System:

Decoding the Law and A
Guide for Survivors of Sexual
Violence.
During the launch, British
High Commissioner to India
James Bevan said, No one
would seriously contest that
women and girls face huge
problems in India. But nor can
one contest that there has
been significant progress in
this country over the last two

tioned about the security features, GPS system, route of the cab
and of the accused on the day of
the incident, previous complaints
of the driver, number of drops
Yadav did during his period and
feedback on them and background

BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

total of 255 places in Delhi have been identiA

fied as isolated and sensitive in the wake of
the rape of a young executive by a cabbie and the
Delhi Police has been asked to keep a strict vigil
in these areas. The isolated and sensitive locations
include roads, parks and public spaces, according
to a Home Ministry report.
While the police control room number 100 is
currently operating with increased capacity of 100
lines from the earlier 60 lines, women helpline 1091
is also running with increased capacity of 10 lines.
Earlier it had only four lines.
The number of PCR vans has been increased
to 1,000 and CCTV cameras were also installed in
200 buses in the national capital. The Government
has also installed 377 CCTV cameras in Delhi and
1,550 CCTV cameras will be installed soon
Installation of GPS has been made mandatory in
all public utility vehicles, the report said.
Government has provided training in self-defence
to 14,373 women in Delhi in 2014 itself.
Delhi has 11 districts and all the districts have
fast-track court and the conviction rate in rape cases
is at 36 per cent in Delhi, which is much higher than
the national average of 27 per cent, the report said.

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of the organisation and functioning in India.

They have sought more time
from us to reply to our queries. We
have asked them to submit the
employee database, which they
will provide soon as it will be
retrieved from their office in San
Francisco, said DCP, North
Madhur Verma. Police officials
also suggested that an emergency
button should be present in the car.
Uber has also provided the
cops with the log of the activities
carried out by the cab and the driver on the day of the incident.
They also told the cops that they
have shut down their application
in Delhi.
My deepest sympathies with
the victim. We are cooperating
with the police and I cannot
divulge further details since investigations are underway, said Eric
Alexander.

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years in tackling those problems. He lauded the role of

individuals in the Indian legal
system fighting for womens
rights, bureaucrats, non-governmental organisations,
among others.
Highlighting that feminism should be for everyone,
Bevan said, It is the radical
notion that women are people.
I am proud to call myself a
Feminist. There is a magic
bullet for development which
is educating women, he said,
adding, educated girls become
empowered women and they
make their own future. The two
books, which navigate through
the criminal justice system and
locate the survivor in the
Indian criminal justice system, have been published by
the Lawyers Collective and
co-published by the British
High Commission.

working women in various

areas of Delhi on Saturday and
Sunday and apprise the
Government about them.
Due to failure of the
Delhi Commission for Women
(DCW) to discharge its duties,
the issues regarding women are
raised only when a critical incident happens and no serious
action is taken afterwards. It is
an irony that the Chairperson
of Delhi Women Commission
is such a person who enjoys the
benefits of the post but does not
fight for the issues of women
safety, said Upadhyay.
He further said, The
Congress which has been shedding crocodile tears regarding
safety of women for the last few
days, should tell the people of
Delhi what steps have been
taken for the security of
women by former Congress
MLA and Chairperson of
DCW Barkha Singh.

BC055A4?>AC4AQ =4F34;78

delegation of Aam Aadmi

Party (AAP) MPs on
A
Wednesday met Union Home
Minister Rajnath Singh and
took up the issue of the security of women in Delhi while
seeking to make police more
accountable in this regard.
The delegation comprising
AAPs parliamentary leader
Dharma vira Gandhi, MP Sadhu
Singh and senior leader Manish
Sisodia also called for the verification of licences of radio cab
drivers and deployment of PCR
vans for the security of women
in the wake of the rape of a
woman executive in a cab.
Reiterating his partys stand
on the need for fixing responsibility to ensure that womens
safety received proper attention,
Sisodia said that not only junior
officers, action should be also

taken against senior officers

for lapses leading to any untoward incident.
The Government should
fix responsibility on anybody,
IAS or IPS officer, responsible
for a lapse. Till the time heads
dont roll, conditions will not
improve. Senior police officers
should also be asked to undertake night patrols. That will
ensure that the junior staff is
more alert. If any untoward
incident takes place, then the
officer in-charge should be
held responsible, Sisodia said.
The AAP leaders, who presented a memorandum to the
Home Minister, further said
that, instead of being used to
cover MPs and secure the
Lutyens Zone, PCR vans should
be deployed to ensure the safety of women. We asked the
Home Minister as to what the
Government has done to ensure

the security of women in the last

few months. Delhi Police is
deploying PCR vans for the
security of MPs and the Lutyens
Zone. Anywhere an MP goes, he
is followed by a PCR van. The
vans should instead be pressed
into service for the safety of
women, Sisodia said.
The party demanded that
the Delhi Transport department should be directed to
carry out verification of driving
licences and doubtful ones
should be handed over to the
traffic police. All private taxi
service operators should be
immediately served notices by
the Transport department to
supply records of their drivers
and get their taxis verified
afresh, the memorandum said.
AAP, meanwhile, extended
its support to the Government
saying that if it needs help, the
party has an army of volunteers.

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emnants of a Shiva temple

having two shrines were
R
found during an excavation
carried out at Jami Masjid
mosque and its adjacent areas
in Gujarat about 35 years ago,
the Government informed the
Rajya Sabha on Wednesday.
Replying to a question
whether two ancient Shiva temples were traced in Jami Masjid
at Sidhpur district in Gujarat
between May, 1979 and April,
1980 in Rajya Sabha, Minister
of State for Culture Mahesh
Sharma said that "while exposing parts of mosque and adjacent area after removal of modern buildings, the remnants of
a Shiva temple having two
shrines were found."
On the details of scientific
excavations carried out at the

archaeological monuments of
Rudramahalaya and Jami
Masjid at Sidhpur district of
Patan in Gujarat during the
same period, he said plinth of
the temple was exposed and
sculptures, architectural members, decorative mouldings
were found after scientific
excavations.
To a question on the present
status of planning and development for clearance operations,
preservation of ruins of
Rudramahalaya and Jami Masjid,
he said that in the clearance operations, modern buildings adjacent to Jami Masjid, obstructing
the view of these monuments,
have been removed.
The works attended
includes clearance of debris,
pathways, stone paving around
Torana and construction of
compound wall, he added.

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From Page 1
The BJP-led NDA
Government (1999- 2004) conferred Bharat Ratna on singer
Lata Mangeshkar, Ustad
Bismillah Khan, Amartya Sen,
Pandit Ravi Shankar, Gopinath
Bordoloi and Jayaprakash
Narayan.
The BJP had expressed its
reservation last year, when the
UPA Government had
announced the Bharat Ratna
for cricketer-turned-RS member Sachin Tendulkar and
scientist CNR Rao, as it felt

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I, Rajaneesh Kumar S/o

Late Ram Vinay Singh R/o
FF-13, Vardan Apartment
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(U.P.) have changed my
name to Rajneesh Kumar
for all purposes.
PD(6375)A

that the C ongress-led

Government had deliberately ignored the contribution of
Vajpayee.
Marking December 25,
Prime Minister Narendra
Modi, all the Union Ministers
and BJP MPs will go to their
respective constituencies and
States (in case of RS members)
and participate in Swachchh
Bharat Abhiyan

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From Page 1
On guidelines to prohibit
investment of funds outside
India and having broad guidelines for investment by insurers,
the committee decided to retain
the provisions as proposed in the
law by saying IRDA should be
free to formulate adequate rules
and regulations. IRDA must
facilitate the entry of multinational insurance brokers so that
they can provide an added impetus to the Indian insurance and
reinsurance sector, the report
said. Keeping in view the scale of
re-insurance business worldwide and the low level of its
development in the country,
combined with the huge potential, the committee has recommended doing away with any
ambiguity in the proposed Bill
on the word `re-insurance.
The committee has recommended modifying the definition of re-insurance to mean that
insurance of part of ones insurers risk by another insurer who
accepts the risk for a mutually
accepted premium. The committee also accepted IRDAs suggestion to modify Section 3(3) of
Act 1938 to allow a foreign
company engaged in re-insurance business through a branch
established in India.
The committee recommended that the provision of
cancellation of license should be
exercised by the authority with
abundant caution to avoid
unnecessary hardship and
penalization of a good company and its policy holders, especially when shortcomings may
be due to circumstances beyond
its control.
The Select Committee has
agreed not to bring down the
paid-up equity capital in the

FTaT_^fTa[TbbbPh

From Page 1
It is the job of the
Government to enforce the
ban and that can only be done
after the Government asks its
agencies to deactivate the Uber
App and also shut down its
control room, said a senior
Delhi Police official earlier in
the day, pleading anonymity.
Our job is to regulate
traffic and also enforce the
Motor Vehicle Act. We cannot
ban an app that is not under
our domain. It is the job of the
Delhi Transport Authority to
make the app dysfunctional as
the same is issued and permitted by them, the police official

told The Pioneer.

We have registered an
FIR against Uber management on charges of cheating,
disobeying the Government
order and common intent
under Section 406/188/34 of
the IPC. Penal action will be
initiated once the probe is
over, said the police official.
While the authorities were
playing the blame game Uber
cabs were plying in the city
with impunity.
Facing the brunt of the
publics ire for its failure to
enforce the ban on Uber, a visibly embarrassed STA put the
onus on Traffic Police to exe-

health insurance sector as compared to the life and general

insurance sector, as it would lead
to non-serious players entering
the field. The panel suggested
that the capital requirements
for health insurers may be
retained at the Rs 100-crore
level to ensure health insurers
have adequate capacity for providing critical services to citizens,
while pitching for giving top priority to this segment. The committee felt IRDA and Medical
Council of India should formulate regulations to ensure that
malpractices in health insurance sector such as unnecessary
investigations, procedures, hospitalization can be avoided.
However, based on the
requests of representatives of
insurance cooperatives to
strengthen the micro-insurance
sector by reducing the capital
requirement to help them serve
the vulnerable section of society,
the committee agreed to lower
this cap for them. The representatives of insurance cooperatives felt the regulatory barrier
of Rs 100 crores as paid up capital requirement for entry into
the life insurance sector was a
huge disincentive.
The committee accepted
their plea and recommended
reduction in the paid up capital
requirement for co-operatives to
help them access the market segment that has not been assessed
by the mainstream, large insurance companies. The committee
felt that the low operating costs
with which the cooperatives
function will enable them to offer
affordable products for the
underprivileged and complement the social insurance
schemes.
During the hearings of the

committee, the industry chambers and private sector insurance

companies had insisted on freedom in paying their agents/intermediaries, which may not necessarily be in proportion to the
business generated by the company. The proposed Bill limits
expenditure on commission.
The Select Committee recommended that adequate protective
mechanism be instituted by
IRDA to ensure agents get their
commission and the commission
structure be determined by
IRDA on market conditions. It
also recommended the
Government to review new
Section 40D in consultation
with IRDA so that the insurers
are not prohibited from earning
re-insurance commission and to
ensure there are no roadblocks
in the growth of the reinsurance
industry.
The committee advised
IRDA to examine the concept of
proposed Multiple Corporate
Agency and frame guidelines to
allow an agency to operate for
more than two insurance companies (both life and non-life). As
per existing norms one corporate
agency can sell products for
and on behalf of only one life and
one general insurance company.
There was a suggestion to allow
MCAs to operate at least ten
insurance companies simultaneously (both life and general)
since they incur huge overhead
expenses. It was felt MCA will
help in providing better services
to policy holders also.
The committee also sought
to put in place certain protective
mechanisms and felt that the
insurance companies cannot
completely absolve themselves
from acts of omissions and commissions of their agents. It recommended that penalties on
insurance companies be linked
to seriousness of offences committed by them and suggested

mechanism to ensure that there

is minimum scope for subjective
interpretation.
The panel suggested that
adequate provisions should be
made to prevent scope for misuse by the insurance companies
and policy holders are not victimized for minor aberrations.
As of now, any non-disclosure or
wrong disclosure due to ignorance or lack of awareness
allowed the insurer to repudiate
a claim under the policy.
The committee also recommended inclusion of representatives of self-help groups and
insurance cooperative societies
and eminent persons not related with insurance business in
Life Insurance Council and
General Insurance Council for
better corporate governance.
The committee urged the
Government to examine the
industrys suggestion for a
Separate Insurance Tribunal as
appellate authority for the insurance sector. As of now, IRDA has
the power to look into complaints. It suggested that any
insurer or intermediary aggrieved by any order under the
Insurance Act can go with an
appeal to the Securities Appellate
Tribunal. It also suggested inclusion of a person from the insurance industry in the Securities
Appellate Tribunal as an expert.
And, recommended necessary
modifications in the Securities
and Exchange Board of India
Act, 1992, for the inclusion.
Based on the Supreme Court
judgement that suggested there
was no need for two categories
of nominees - beneficiary nominee and collector nominee, the
committee said that the
Government in consultation
with IRDA and Law Ministry
should modify the definition of
the term nominee in order to
remove any ambiguity or subsequent litigation.

cute the order.

When contacted the STA
officials said that they had sent
an official communiqu to
Delhi Traffic Police to ensure
that the ban was enforced in
toto. We asked the Delhi Traffic
Police to immediately implement the ban on web-based cab
services, including Uber, in the
National Capital, they said.
However, senior police
officials of Delhi Traffic Police
refuted that they had received
any communiqu from the
STA. We have not got any letter from transport department.
Traffic police is unable to
implement such order, said a
senior police official.
It would be pertinent to
mention here that STA had

issued notification on Monday

and had clarified that only six
radio taxi operators - Meru,
Mega, Chanson, Yo, Air and
Easy, are authorised to run radio
taxi services in Delhi. All other
transport service providers
through web-based technology,
who are not recognised, are prohibited from providing such
services till they get a licence
from
the
Transport
Department, the notification
had said. Uber, Ola Cabs, Taxi
for Sure and TaxiPixi are mobileapplication based cab booking
services that have been operating in Delhi since the past few
months. With the ban coming
into effect, an estimated 10,000
taxis associated with web applications will be affected.

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From Page 1
Satyarthi said, Friends, the
Nobel Committee generously
invited me to deliver a lecture.
Respectfully, I am unable to do
that. I represent here the sound
of silence, the cry of innocence, and, the face of invisibility. I have come here to share the
voices and dreams of our children, our children, because
they are all our children.
He asked the audience to
feel the child inside them and
said the crime against children
has no place in a civilised society. Satyarthi said, My dream
is to make every child free to
develop...There is no greater
violence than to deny the
dreams of children.
Recounting his experience
with the unprivileged people,
he said, I am representing the
sound of silence of millions of
children who are left behind
The credit to this honour goes
to people who worked and sacrificed for freeing children.

?X^]TTa_W^c^

I refuse to accept that the

shackles of slavery can ever be
stronger than the quest for freedomLet us inculcate and
transform the individuals compassion into a global movement. Let us globalise compassion. Not passive compassion, but transformative compassion that leads to justice,
equality, and freedom,
Satyarthi said.
Invoking
Mahatma
Gandhi, he said, If we are to
teach real peace in this world...
We shall have to begin with the
children. I humbly add, let us
unite the world through the
compassion for our children.
Malala, who was nominated in the peace prize category last year also, had displayed tremendous courage
even after the Taliban attack
when she resolutely expressed
her determination to carry on
with her campaign for child
rights and girls education especially in a country like Pakistan.

In her speech, she said, I

am honoured to receive this
award together with Kailash
Satyarthi, who has been a champion of childrens rights for a
long time. Twice as long, in fact,
than I have been alive. I am also
glad that we can stand together and show the world that an
Indian and a Pakistani can be
united in peace and together
work for childrens rights.
This award is not just for
me. It is for those forgotten
children who want education.
It is for those frightened children who want peace. It is for
those voiceless children who
want change, she said in her
acceptance speech.
She dedicated the Nobel
Prize money to the Malala Fund,
to help give girls everywhere a
quality education. Famed
Pakistani singer Rahat Fateh
Ali Khan and Indian musician
Amjad Ali Khan performed at
the award ceremony. Pakistans
former Prime Minister Yousuf
Raza Gilani was among those
present on the occasion.

From Page 1
Five States Bihar,
Madhya Pradesh, Punjab,
Sikkim and Delhi did not
fully support the move citing
reservations, Chaudhary said.
The Commission had
regarded attempt to suicide as
a manifestation of a diseased
condition of mind deserving
treatment and care rather than
punishment. A Constitution
Bench of the Supreme Court in
Gian Kaur v State of Punjab in
1996 had upheld the validity of
Section 309 on the ground that
Right to Life under Article 21
did not give citizens the right to
die as Constitution upholds
the right to live and cannot be
expected to grant a right that
extinguishes this valuable right.
Bihar sought a separate legislation to take care of persons
suffering from such kinds of
disease, apprehending that the
removing Section 3039 from
IPC will benefit suicide bombers
who fail in their attempt terrorists who try to end their lives by
consuming cyanide pills.
Madhya Pradesh argued
that deleting Section 309 would
further dilute Section 306
(abetment of suicide). It left it
to courts to consider whether
or not to punish the victims of
attempted suicide after considering their mental status
and circumstances. It cited statistics to suggest out of 100 such
cases only five were sent behind
bars. Also, it pointed out a tendency of various social activists
who threaten to go on a fastunto-death or attempt self
immolation. If the Section is
deleted, then there is no provision for police to book these
persons, the state said.

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?=BQ =4F34;78

he Opposition on Wednesday
came down heavily on the
Government in the Lok Sabha on
the economic situation of the country, saying its policies were weakening the fundamentals and
accused it of reducing the allocation
for the social sector Ministries.
Initiating a debate on supplementary demands for grants,
senior Congress leader M Veerappa
Moily said steps taken by the
Government during the last six
months proved that it was a prorich and anti-poor regime.
Moily said front page stories in
every newspaper may be in favour
of the Government, but all write
ups in the inside pages on the economic issues are against you.
Where are the achchhe din? the
former Union Minister asked, referring to promises made by the ruling
BJP during the election campaign.
You have been in power for more

than six months...It (achchhe din) is

not seen in the horizon Fundamentals are becoming weak. You
must agree. It will take some years
to restore the confidence, he said.
Accusing the Government of
being insensitive towards the problems of various sections including
farmers and manufacturing sectors,
Moily said the Government should
agree that job creation has been
reduced totally.
Moily told Finance Minister
Arun Jaitley, who placed the supplementary demands for approval,
that the FM should not have been
made the Information and

Broadcasting Minister although it

is a colourful job.
He said the Finance Ministry
requires total focus and being a
good Finance Minister, Jaitley
cannot handle both the Ministries.
The Congress leader also
attacked the Governments policies
on banking and oil sector and said
that the move to restructure the
Planning Commission will destroy
the economy.
Saugata Roy (TMC) criticised
the Government for cutting expenditure on social sector schemes,
including MNREGA, saying it was
cruel that poorest sections were
being deprived of wages under
rural job scheme.
He said the Reserve Bank of
India has ignored the Finance
Ministers plea to bring down
interest rate despite easing of inflation and added that the Finance
Minister was helpless in face of
RBI Governor, who is a noted
economist.

already been relaxed in defence sector and has generated lot of interest from top global manufacturers.
On the growth prospects, Jaitley
said there are challenges but hoped
that it would be within the projected
range of 5.4-5.9 per cent in 201415 and cross 6 per cent in the next
financial year. Economic growth fell
to sub-5 per cent in two consecutive fiscals in 2012-13 and 2013-14,
he said, adding it had an impact on
revenue collection, fiscal deficit
and Governments expenditure on
developmental works.

Referring to the petroleum

price issue, Jaitley said his
Government has reduced prices
seven times and if the trend continues, we will reduce it further.
The Government, he added, did
increase the excise duty on petrol
and diesel to raise some revenue to
meet its development expenditure. The hike in excise in diesel
and petrol is expected to yield the
exchequer C10,500 crore in the current financial year.
On certain issues raised by the
opposition parties during the debate,

Jaitley said it was a myth that prices

of essential drugs have gone up. The
other myth was that the
Government is amending the patent
law, he said, adding there was a proposal of the previous Government
which has been dropped.
The Minister also clarified
that the NDA Government has not
reduced the allocation for MGNREGA scheme. As regards the
subsidies, he said, the Government
would continue it for the poor but
would curtail it for those who do
not need it.

ith the Opposition targeting

W
the Government on its handling of the economy, Finance
Minister Arun Jaitley on
Wednesday countered it saying the
NDA dispensation inherited an
economic situation of negative
sentiment, where no one was willing to invest but the Modi regimes D]X^]5X]P]RT<X]XbcTa0ad]9PXc[ThX]cWT
?C8
initiatives in the works will attract ;^ZBPQWP^]FTS]TbSPh
large foreign investments. He said Supplementary Demands for
he was hopeful of an over 6 per Grants for an additional expenditure of over C12,500 crore.
cent growth in 2014-15.
Pointing that the Government is However, the actual cash outgo
working on a civilised tax regime would be C500 crore and remainto attract investments from overseas ing expenditure would be
and raising the foreign investment matched by saving or enhanced
cap in insurance sector soon, Jaitley receipts and recoveries.
Advocating greater powers for
lashed out at the erstwhile UPA
Government for its ultra-aggressive States, Jaitley said a principle of
tax policy. There was reduced eco- cooperative federalism is being folnomic activity. The negative senti- lowed in setting up the new body
ment was further accelerated by in place of Planning Commission.
ultra-aggressive tax policy, he said. Our Government stands by the
He did not name the Vodafone case principle of cooperative federalism,
but said the retrospective tax brought empowering States, least number
during UPA rule had only brought of Central schemes and more State
bad name to India rather than gar- schemes, he said.
Referring to the Select
ner any additional revenue.
He talked about cooperative Committee report on further
federalism and announced the opening of insurance sector, Jaitley
release of C11,000 crore to States in said, Large investments are waitthe current fiscal as part payment ing to come in. We have to open
towards CST compensation to facil- the doors. The committee has sugitate roll-out of the Goods and gested a composite foreign investServices Tax (GST). He will be ment cap of 49 per cent in the
meeting the State Finance Ministers insurance sector, as against 26 per
cent FDI cap currently.
on the issue on Thursday.
On attracting overseas investJaitley was replying to the
debate in the Lok Sabha on ments, he said, FDI regime has

?8>=44A=4FBB4AE824Q =4F34;78

he entire Opposition on
Wednesday staged a walkout in the
T
Rajya Sabha over the Government not
passing on the benefit of falling prices
of petroleum products in the international market to the consumers and
instead levying additional excise duty.
The Government, however, rejected this contention saying the NDA
Government had reduced the price of
petrol by C10 and diesel by C9 in the last
six months. Moreover, the additional
excise duty was levied recently to generate resources for funding social welfare schemes, Minister of Petroleum and
Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan said.
Raising the issue, Tapan Sen
(CPM) said even as international
prices of crude oil had dropped, the
Government did not pass on this benefit to the consumers. He claimed that
the price of petrol should be at least C20
less and diesel C15 as per the current
trend and said the so-called faulty pricing policy of the Government had led
to the present situation.
Several Opposition members
including Congress leader Satyavrat
Chaturvedi associated themselves with
Sen and grilled the Government over
this gap in prices. They contended that
reduction in petrol and diesel prices
domestically in the last six months was
not commensurate with declining
global crude oil prices.
Pradhan countered and said the
Government has reduced petrol and
diesel prices. The Opposition, however, said while reduction in crude oil
prices was around 45 per cent, the cut
in retail prices of fuel was only about
12 per cent in India but the Petroleum

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Minister did not agree with this argument. The House then saw some
sharp exchanges between the treasury
and Opposition benches.
Justifying the petroleum policy,
Pradhan said retail prices were calculated using a transparent formula and
the difference between the price paid
to the refinery and final retail selling
price was on account of a host of elements including excise duty, state
taxes, subsidies and freight. He said the
facts on oil prices presented by
Opposition were misleading. However,
the Opposition was not satisfied with
the Ministers answer and all parties
including Congress, Samajwadi Party,
Trinamool Congress, Left and JD(U)
staged a walkout.

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?=BQ =4F34;78

hreatened with a censure

motion,
Trinamool
Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee
on Wednesday expressed regret
over his objectionable remarks
against Prime Minister
Narendra Modi and former
Prime Minister Lal Bahadur
Shastri, after the Treasury
Benches backed by a section of
the Opposition refused to settle anything less than an apology from the errant MP.
If I have hurt anyone, I
express my regret, he said
after Speaker Sumitra Mahajan
told him that he should express
regret though she cannot force
him to do so.
At first, the TMC MP
merely said that he had no
intention to insult the Prime
Minister or former Prime
Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri.
Regarding his allegedly foul
comments against Shastri, he
claimed those were in reaction to BJPs West Bengal incharges (who is grandson of
Shastri) insulting comments
Bhag Mamata Bhag
against West Bengal Chief
Minister Mamata Bannerjee.
His statement was not

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^]FTS]TbSPh
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acceptable to BJP leaders

including Parliamentary Affairs
Minister M Venkaiah Naidu
who said he expected regrets
from the TMC MP but he is
only making technical points.
Naidu said it is a very serious issue as foul language was
used against our elected Prime
Minister and nothing less than
an apology was acceptable.
The Minister said lest an
apology was tendered by the
MP, a House committee should
inquire into the slogans by the
member raised inside the
House, besides the videos of his
speech made outside and take
a decision as per the rules.

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?=BQ =4F34;78

he National Green Tribunal

has summoned wildlife officials of MoEF and Madhya
Pradesh over rampant illegal
sand mining around Son Gharial
Sanctuary in the State. As per
official figures, there are only 19
ghariyals left in Son river.
The green court in its orders
on Tuesday directed State
Government to take measures
to ensure no illegal sand mining is allowed in the area. The
State Forest Department has
been asked to place on record
impact of such measures taken
in the past six months. The next
hearing is on January 14.
Mining of sand banks is
destructive for ghariyal population as they are essential for
nesting and basking, said
Mishra in his petition, adding,
ghariyals lay eggs under sand
beds, but illegal sand mining
destroys their nests.
The directives of the tribunal come in the wake of
complaint filed by advocate and
social activist Nithyanand
Mishra before the green panel
claiming that sand mining in
and around Son River is posing a major threat to the last of
the wild and breeding ghariyals
left in the sanctuary running
across UP and MP.

Kirit Somaiya (BJP) said

there should be unconditional apology from him for his
remarks against Modi and former Prime Minister Shastri.
Congress
leader
Mallikarjun Kharge, however,
wondered why the issue was
being raised as it was deemed
to have been resolved earlier.
He said statements made outside the House should not be
discussed inside as it would create a wrong precedent.
To this, Naidu said he was
also against discussing statements made outside the House
but this time round you started it (seeking apology from
Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti).
SP leader Mulayam Singh
Yadav also criticised the TMC
members comments.
After hearing Naidu and
Congress leader, Speaker
Sumitra Mahajan said, No one
becomes small by seeking an
apology. She said members
should have control over their
language and speech outside and
inside the House. Responding to
the Speakers appeal, Banerjee
said, If I have hurt anybodys
sentiments, I express my regrets.
The House proceeding continued thereafter.

?=BQ =4F34;78

n the wake of recent terror

attacks in Jammu & Kashmir
Iincluding
an assault on an
Army camp in Uri
last week in which
eight Army personnel were killed,
Defence Minister
Manohar Parrikar
will visit Srinagar on
Thursday to take
stock of the ground situation.
This is his maiden visit to the
State after assuming charge as
Defence Minister last month.
Army chief General Dalbir
Singh Suhag and top commanders of Northern
Command will brief him about
the security scenario in
Srinagar, officials said here on
Wednesday. The Army brass
will also apprise the Minister
about operational preparedness to deal with terrorists
who are now better armed and
trained by the ISI and Pakistan
Army in training camps across
the Line of Control (LoC).
Parrikar will also visit the
Headquarters of the 15 Corps in
Srinagar and pay homage to
Army personnel martyred while

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?=BQ =4F34;78

n order to enhance security system for train passengers, a massive security overhaul is on the anvil in Railways. Security
escort teams will be deployed in about 5,000 trains soon. At
present, only 1,300 trains of the 11,000 running daily, are being
escorted by RPF teams.
The Railway Protection Force (RPF) personnel will be
equipped with mobile phones to remain connected with passengers. Our aim is to cover as many as 5,000 trains by RPF escorting teams. We are in the process of recruiting 16,500 RPF personnel
by April and we are hoping to cover more trains to be escorted
thereafter, said RPF Director General Krishna Choudhary at a
three-day sensitisation programme for escorting personnel.
There are about 11,000 trains running daily of which only a
few trains are being provided security escort service. Currently,
about 1300 trains are
being escorted by RPF
while GRP is involved in
escorting 2200 trains.
Generally four to six
personnel are deployed
for escorting a train barring Naxal and other
sensitive areas where
about 20 RPF personnel
are involved in the job.
Chaudhary said that
each escort party will be given a mobile phone and that phone number will be made known to the passengers of that particular train.
Railways is in discussion with mobile service operators to have a
special series of number for this purpose.
Northern Railway General Manager Pradeep Kumar said the
focus should be on ensuring security of passengers and create
fear in the minds of criminals. Enforcement of the law of the
land is essential and for that fear in the minds of criminal for
law enforcing agency is necessary as deploying one cop for one
man is not possible," he said.

He
said
Churhat,
Khadbada, Piparohar, Akauri,
Gaughat and Patpara in Sidhi
are worst-affected areas due to
mining that is unabated in
connivance with local authorities and police.
Mining of sand banks is
destructive for ghariyal population as they are essential for
nesting and basking, said
Mishra in his petition, adding,
ghariyals lay eggs under sand
beds, but illegal sand mining
destroys their nests.
Sand mining is against
Environment (Protection) Act
1986,
Environment
(Protection) Act 1986, Air
(Prevention and Control of
Pollution) Act 1981 and Water
(Prevention and Control of
Pollution) Act, 1974. and Water
(Prevention and Control of
Pollution) Act, 1974.

combating militancy in the State.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi
had visited the 15 Corps
Headquarters on Monday. At
least 15 security men have died
in the last fortnight
in three encounters
with terrorists in
Arnia, Naugam
and Uri.
Me anw hi le,
Parrikar
on
Wednesday got a
detailed briefing on various
Defence issues lasting nearly
three hours. Some of the issues
pertained to pace of modernisation of the armed forces and
procurement of weapon systems, officials said.

:_UZRe`Via`ce
WZcdehRcdYZa`_
5VTV^SVc#!
New Delhi: India will export
its first warship later this
month, a move that is seen as
a big leap for the countrys
Defence public sector units.
CGS Barracuda, a 75 ft by 15
ft off-shore patrol vehicle, will
be handed over to Mauritius
on December 20 and will be
first such export by India.
The island nation has
bought the ship for about `300
crore. This is a big leap for
domestic Defence manufacturers as this is the first time
when we are delivering a ship
that has been purchased by a
foreign country, sources said.
The ship is built by stateowned Garden Reach
Shipbuilders & Engineers Ltd.

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=_TYecY^W1b]iQcd__\V_b
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?=BQ =4F34;78

he Congress on Wednesday
accused Prime Minister
T
Narendra Modi of using the
Army as a tool for politicking as
it condemned the remarks by
him pertaining to the killing of
two youths in Jammu & Kashmir
in an action by security forces.
It is deeply regrettable that
none other than the head of the
Government has used the Army
as canon fodder during a political campaign in a sensitive State
like J&K. Even remotely bringing the Army into political discourse is not only condemnable
but dangerous, Congress
spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi
said at the AICC briefing.
The party on Tuesday had
complained to the Election
Commission against the Prime

Minister, accusing him of dragging the Army into political

controversy in violation of the
Model Code of Conduct during
campaigning for polls in J&K.
At a rally in Srinagar on
Monday, Modi had said that for
the first time in 30 years, a
Government had acted against
Armymen responsible for the
killing of two innocent
teenagers in an incident which
took place recently in Budgam.
Using Army as a tool for
politicking is deplorable. Even
the political point which the
Modi Government is making is
incorrect, false and baseless.
Between 2004 and 2014, Army
had held numerous inquiries and
even conducted court martial
when required, Singhvi said.
Unfortunately, BJP and the
PM believe that the world began,

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?=BQ =4F34;78

llaying apprehensions that

Indias present stand at the
A
WTO will compromise its position and will impact its PDS and
Food Security programmes,
Commerce and Industry
Minister Nirmala Sitharaman
said on Wednesday that the
Government has only tried to
make Indias position stronger at
the international forum.
Terming the Bali agreement signed by the UPA
Government as imperfect, the
Minister in Rajya Sabha during
a discussion on her statement
on Indias stand at WTO said
that there was a need for course
correction to protect the interest of the Indian farmers.
While rejecting the
Oppositions charge that India
had lost friends in the process
of the WTO talks and is now
trapped in the cobweb,
Sitharaman said: I would like
to tell you here that under the
leadership of Prime Minister

=Xa\P[PBXcWPaP\P]

Narendra Modi we have got in

as an Abhimanyu but we came
out successfully with 160
friends, building on our predecessor, who had 93 friends.
She asserted that the
Government was ensuring that
Indias sovereign right is strengthened and the decision at WTO
is a new one. She underlined that
any solution at this forum has to
be also agreeable to India also
and until that happens no step
can be taken forward.
This is a new decision
with a new date. The ambiguity which prevailed has been
removed. 2014 agreement has
an accelerated mechanism for

permanent solution and there

will be dedicated sessions for
solving agriculture related
problems, Sitharaman said.
Opposition members
argued that Indias position at
WTO was confusing and hoped
Indias interests would not be
compromised on the signing of
the trade agreement. They
sought to know protective measures for farmers for their products and asked if India had
decided to go along with USA
and in the bargain lost its other
friends among the group of
developing nations which India
was leading.
Congresss Anand Sharma, a
former Commerce Minister,
accused the Minister of misleading the House and the country and challenged her saying the
work on delinking negotiations
on public stock holding for food
subsidy purposes was arrived at
Bali. CPI(M)s Sitaram Yechury
sought to know what permanent
solution India was looking at as
subsidies cannot go forever.

became virtuous and commendable, after their Government came to power. That is a
mindset which requires a complete reset, Singhvi said, rejecting Modis public claim.
Holding that the biggest
guarantee for democracy has
been an anonymous Army
that does not take part in the
political discourse nor is dragged
into it by the political system,
Singhvi charged that the PMs
remarks were crass politics.

EXeTZBaXePbcPeP
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?=BQ =4F34;78

he Centre on Wednesday
appointed senior IPS offiT
cer from Gujarat cadre Vivek
Srivastava as Inspector
General in the elite Special
Protection Group (SPG)
which guards Prime Minister
Narendra Modi, some former
PMs and their immediate
family members.
Srivastava, a 1989-batch
IPS officer, will be the seniormost IPS officer in the elite
force. Srivastava, at present a
Joint Director in Intelligence
Bureau, was cleared by the
Appointments Committee of
Cabinet headed by the PM.
Srivastavas term with SPG is
being treated as a deputation
from the Intelligence Bureau
so that, upon completion of
his term, he can return to the
covert agency.
Srivastava was the head of
the Subsidiary Intelligence
Bureau in Patna last year when
Modis rally in the Bihar capital was attacked by banned terror outfit Indian Mujahideen
(IM). He was also involved in
the operation leading to the
arrest of Yaseen Bhatkal, one of
the founder members of IM.
SPG was headless after K
Durga Prasad, a 1981-batch
Andhra Pradesh batch IPS
officer, was moved out on
November 25.

]PcX^]%

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?=BQ =4F34;78

he
Opposition
on
Wednesday expressed concern in Parliament over the issue
of religion conversion in Agra
and charged the RSS affiliate
Bajrang Dal with alluring poor
gullible families to change their
religion. The Government,
however, said it was duty bound
to uphold Constitution and the
State Government had lodged
an FIR even as the Opposition
demanded a clarification from
Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Members of BSP, Congress,
Left, Trinamool Congress
(TMC), Samajwadi Party (SP)
and JD(U) raised the issue in
the Rajya Sabha while TMC
drew the attention to the issue
in the Lok Sabha.
Raising the issue in the
Rajya Sabha during as soon as
it met for the day, BSP supremo Mayawati said RSS-affiliate
Bajrang Dal converted some
Muslim families to Hindus in
Agra by force and allurement.

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This is a serious matter as

allurement was given to poor to
get them converted, she
claimed adding a similar exercise was planned in Aligarh
towards this month-end to
convert Christians into Hindus.
Warning that such conversions will lead to communal tension all over the country, the BSP
leader sought strict action and
the Government should take
serious note of Agra accident.
Though the issue was a State
subject, she asked the Central
Government to intervene as it
was duty bound to uphold

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=P`eX

Constitution which guarantees

religious freedom and provide
security to all religions.
She was vociferously supported by members from
Congress, Left, TMC and SP
despite Deputy Chairman PJ
Kurine asking them to allow
the Zero Hour to proceed.
Anand Sharma (Congress) said
the Government should be
directed to give a clarification
on the issue.
Minister of State for
Parliamentary Affairs Mukhtar
Abbas Naqvi said the State
Government had registered a

FIR and charged the

Opposition with trying to gain
political mileage out of the
issue. Commenting that secularism is nobodys monopoly,
he objected to RSS name being
mentioned in the case saying it
was not appropriate to take
name of the organisation for
political reasons.
Sitaram Yechury (CPM)
said the Prime Minister
should come to the House and
clarify on the issue. India is
a secular democratic republic
and it will remain so. If
attempts are made to change

it, you will not remain but

India will remain, he said.
Digvijay Singh (Congress)
said religious conversions by
force and by allurement are
criminal offence and the
Government should respond.
As treasury benches joined issue
with the Opposition, Kurien
said the Government has come
into existence by taking oath on
the Constitution. It is bound to
uphold principles of the
Constitution. If there are any
violations, Government will take
note of it and take action. The
House resumed normal functioning after nearly 30 minutes
of sharp exchanges between the
treasury and Opposition.
In the Lok Sabha, Sultan
Ahmed(TMC) raised the issue
as soon as the House met the
for the day. What is happening in Agra, he asked waving
the copy of a newspaper.
Speaker Sumitra Mahajan said
she has rejected his notice for
an adjournment notice over
the matter.

VXFKHYHQWVRUGHUVSUREH
?=BQ ;D2:=>F

he State Government on
Wednesday sounded a
T
high alert over the reports of
functions to be organised on
conversion in the State
besides ordering a probe after
lodging an FIR in a case of
alleged forceful conversion
of 57 Muslim families in Agra
on Sunday.
Inspector General (Law
and Order), A Satish Ganesh
told reporters here on
Wednesday evening that DGP
has issued orders to all the district police chiefs for monitoring any such function of conversion in their area. Such incidents will be prevented at any
cost, he said.
When asked about the proposed conversion programme
in Aligarh on December 25, the
IG said that the organisors are
yet to seek permission. We

directed the Aligarh authorities

to keep a tab on the situation,
he added while hinting that
Government would not allow
the programme to be held in
Aligarh at any cost.
Meanwhile, Hindu Yuva
Vahini, an outfit floated by BJP
MP from Gorakhpur, Yogi
Adityanath, will reconvert people (who were forced to convert to Hindus earlier) to
Hindu in a programme at
Ghazipur in eastern UP on
Decemebr 18.
Yuva Vahini State president Sunil Singh on
Wednesday said in Gorakhpur
that the organisation has taken
permission from the administration for the event and they
are hopeful to reconvert 2,000
people in Ghazipur on
December 18.
Earlier, UP chief secretary
Alok Ranjan said here the FIR
has been registered and inves-

tigation is underway. If the

conversion was forceful, then
certainly action would be taken
against the people involved in
it, he stated.
The State Government,
meanwhile, is likely to ban the
proposed conversion of 5,000
more Muslims and Christians
under the programme
Purkhon ki ghar vapsi, to be
jointly organised by Dharma
Jagran Samanvay Vibhag, an
offshoot of the Rashtriya
Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS),
and Bajrang Dal in Aligarh on
December
25
during
Christmas.
The event was slated to be
held at Maheshwari College in
Aligarh, he said. On the other
hand, some Muslim organisations held demonstration in
front of the Mantola police station in Agra in protest against
the conversion and demanded
arrest of RSS leaders.

B^]XPaTSUPRTSPb9:aP[[h_a^eTbU[^_bW^f

<>78C:0=370A8Q 90<<D

o stop BJP in its tracks and

counter its Mission 44
plus, the State unit of the
Congress organised a grand
show at the MAM stadium in
Jammu on Wednesday.
Congress president Sonia
Gandhi and chairman of the
election campaign committee
Ghulam Nabi Azad were
expected to infuse fresh confidence among the party cadre to
accept the BJP challenge as the
campaigning for the last two
rounds of polling is at peak.
Ironically, soon after Sonia
Gandhi, who arrived more
than two hours behind schedule, started addressing the thinly-attended election rally, the
people sitting in the front rows
hurriedly started moving out
of the venue.
Red-faced senior Congress
leaders present on the stage
?C8 were left staring at the empty

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chairs while Congress president

was left with no other option
but to cut short her speech to
avoid further embarrassment.
The Congress supporters
were apparently annoyed with
the late arrival of the Congress
leader and remarks passed by
Ghulam Nabi Azad cautioning

people sitting in the front row

against disturbing media persons doing their duty.
The State Congress leaders
including PCC Chief Prof Saif
Ud Din Soz, AICC General
Secretary Ambika Soni also
could not intervene to save the
situation from taking an ugly
turn. In her brief speech Sonia
targeted BJP Government at the
Centre is fooling the common

masses with tall promises.

She attacked Prime
Minister Narendra Modi as
well and questioned what happened to his claims of bringing
back black money and depositing sum of C15 lakh in peoples
accounts. She also appealed to
the left over crowd to elect
Congress candidates in the
State Assembly to form stable
Government in the State.

6dYPaPcc^U^a\d[PcT]^a\b 8EHU*HQHUDO0DQDJHU "$#_^[[X]VbcPcX^]bbT]bXcXeT

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aking serious note of the

rape incident in a radio cab
T
in the National Capital, Gujarat
Government has initiated a
process to regulate radio taxis
having national permit and
operating in Gujarat.
On Wednesday Gujarat
Transport Minister Vijay
Rupani held a meeting with
senior officials of the transport and police departments
and discussed with them
about the issue in detail.
Rupani instructed officials to
chalk out a system and form

rules and regulation for

national radio taxi operators
functioning in Gujarat.
The State Government has
also instructed the transport
department to collect the data
on radio taxies in Gujarat.
Currently we dont have any
data pertaining to radio taxis as
the operators are having a
national permit, said a senior
official in the State transport
department.
Meanwhile talking to The
Pioneer, the Transport Minister
confirmed that he has asked the
senior officials to ensure that no
such incident (like the one in

Delhi) occurs in Gujarat. He further said the State Government

will take help of transport as well
as law experts to formulate rules.
Rupani said that as of now the
State Government has not
banned any company from
operating in Gujarat
A senior official in the
transport department said that
a detailed study on functioning
of radio taxis will be carried out
soon. We would also give
emphasis on permanent Global
Positioning System (GPS) in
order to ensure safety of the
passengers using radio taxis,
an official said.

Mumbai: In the wake of the alleged rape of a 27-year-old

woman by an Uber cab driver in Delhi, Shailesh Sawlani, general manager of Uber in Mumbai, was reportedly attacked by
a Swabhiman Sanghatana office-bearer, when the former had
come to meet the Transport Commissioner in suburban Bandra
on Wednesday.
KK Tiwari, Union leader (auto-taxi wing) of Swabhiman
Sanghatana, allegedly assaulted Sawlani when he was coming out
after the meeting. However, no formal police complaint has been
lodged in this regard.Swabhiman Sanghatana is led by Congress
MLA Nitesh Rane. Meanwhile, the Maharashtra Government
has decided to ban web-based taxi services in the State. PTI

2WP]Shad[Tb^dc_a^QT
X]c^?F3VaPUcRWPaVT
EA90H0A09Q :>278

eralas Congress Chief

Minister
Oommen
K
Chandy on Wednesday ruled

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?C8

out any kind of probe into the

allegation of corruption raised
in the State Assembly by former
Minister KB Ganesh Kumar, an
MLA of the ruling UDF, against
the office of Public Works
Minister VK Ibrahim Kunju of
the Muslim League.
Citing technical reasons
and defending Kunju and the
Public Works Ministry, Chandy
said in the House that the allegation leveled by Ganesh
Kumar was unclear and that he
had not given the charge in
writing as required by the rules.
He said no probe could be held
into the allegation as Ganesh
Kumar had raised it in the

House in violation of the rules.

However, the Chief
Minister was unable to offer a
proper reply to a question
posed by Opposition Leader
VS Achuthanandan whether
Ganesh Kumars claim that he
had given in writing the allegations of corruption against
the offices of two Ministers as
back as in May last was true.
Chandy effectively evaded the
question saying this had not
come to his notice.
Former Forest minister
and Kerala Congress (B) MLA
Ganesh Kumar had on Tuesday
said in the Assembly that the
office of Minister Kunju was a
tent of corruption and three of
his personal staff members
were indulging in corrupt practices in matters related to State
administration.

Jammu: Around 437 polling

stations on Wednesday in the
Jammu district were declared
as sensitive and hyper-sensitive, ahead of the fifth phase
of Jammu & Kashmir
Assembly elections.
As many as 354 polling stations are sensitive while 83 are
hyper-sensitive in the Jammu
district, District Electoral
Officer Jammu, Ajeet Kumar
Sahu said on Wednesday. There
are a total of 1,224 polling stations in the district, he said.
As many as 10,10,959 electorate including 5,23,945 males

and 4,87,012 females are

expected to exercise their franchise in the fifth and final phase
of the Assembly elections on
December 20.
Eleven Assembly constituencies of Jammu along
with 9 others will go to polls
in 11 segments later this
month, the election official
said, adding that 117 candidates are in the fray.
Jammu, a border district
had faced the brunt of crossborder shelling and firing in
August and October this year,
that left 15 people killed and

over 100 injured.

The district with 7 out of
the 11 Assembly segments
along the border line with
Pakistan, has the most sensitive
polling stations, Sahu said.
Three measures including
deployment of micro observers,
videography of poll process and
web casting of polling booths
have been initiated to keep a
tab on the polling, he said.
More than 400 polling stations shall be covered by the
three measures to keep a check
on unscrupulous elements, the
official informed.
PTI

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0A270=09H>C8Q =4F34;78

ver 1,500 deaths due to

deadly
Japanese
O
Encephalitis (JE)/Acute
Encephalitis Syndrome (AES),
it seems, is yet to wake up the
authorities in 55 endemic districts in the disease-affected
States of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh,
West Bengal and Assam in
ensuring safe water and basic
medical facilities to the locals.
However, Tamil Nadu,
where five districts are affected with the deadly disease, has
fared better in implementing
the national action plan initiated by the Centre last year
wherein targets have been set
up for the States to check the
deadly disease over the years.
In a recent review by the

Health Ministry, which is the

nodal agency in implementing
the plan, it was found that just
half of the total 5,940 identified
habitats in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh,
West Bengal and Assam have
been ensured access to safe
drinking water. Similarly, of
14,875 targeted hand pumps,
just 7,511 have been installed
in the last two years in the disease affected States.
State wise, Uttar Pradesh
has performed worst. Out of
3,378 habitation, 1,364 (40 per
cent) have been provided safe
water while out of target 7,902,
2,422 (30 per cent) hand
pumps have been installed.
In Assam, out of 1,638 habitation, 921 (56 per cent) have
been provided with the PWS
while 280 hand pumps have

been installed. Target was 363.

In Bihar, out of 80 habitation,
only 38 (47) have been provided with the PWS. Similarly, out
of 6170 hand pumps, 4,515
have been installed.
In Tamil Nadu, out of
1,562, 1561 habitation have
been provided with safe water
supply while in West Bengal,
out of 799 habitation, 712
habitation have been provided with the PWS scheme
whereas out of 440 hand
pumps to be installed only
284 (66.81 per cent) have
been installed in the identified ten districts.
If provision of safe drinking water and proper sanitation
is being considered critical for
the prevention and control of
AES, to reduce mortality, mor-

bidity and disability in the

patients it has been decided to
set up a well-equipped 10bedded Paediatric Intensive
Care Unit (PICU) in district
hospitals of 60 priority districts.
However, in UP, so far
only eight PICUs are functional
while in Bihar, the facilities are
available in two districts. In
West Bengal, out of ten districts, PICUs are operational in
seven while in Assam, work is
going on in three districts. Ten
districts are worst affected in
the Northeastern State.
In 2012, 140 people died
due to the JE while in 2013 the
number shot up to 202 while
AES has claimed around 1,395
deaths in the first 11 months
itself in 2014, against 1,273
reported last year.

?=BQ :>278

he Kerala Government on Wednesday

told the High Court that it would hold
T
a study on the impact of its liquor policy

C742><<8CC448=C78B
A460A3F>D;3BD1<8C8CB
A4?>ACF8C78="F44:B

envisaging total liquor ban in ten years,

indirectly giving credence to the argument
of the bar owners opposing the ban that
the policy was declared and was being
implemented without looking into the possible after-effects.
Advocate General KP Dandapani told
a division bench comprising Justices KT
Sankaran and PD Rajan that the secretaries
in the departments of Tourism and Labour
had been asked to carry out the study on
the impact of the liquor policy on those
sectors. This committee would submit its
report within three weeks, the Advocate
General said.
The Advocate Generals submission in
the court came in response to its earlier
directive to inform it about the reports on

the move to bring in practical changes to

the liquor policy announced on August 22.
The court had observed that there was no
point in examining the cases related to
liquor ban currently pending before it if
the policy was going to be changed.
As the committee was to submit its
report in three weeks time, the
Government requested the court to defer
by four weeks the hearing on the case related to the closure of bars as part of the
liquor ban. The court accepted this request
and extended the stay on the Government
order to close down 292 bars till January
20. As per the earlier order, the stay was
to expire on Friday.
The court dismissed a prayer of the

Madya Viruddha Samithi (anti-liquor

council) of the Kerala Catholic Bishops
Conference for revocation of the interim
order staying the closure of three and fourstar bars citing faults in the petition. The
case would now be taken up on January
14 for detailed hearing.
Chief Minister Oommen Chandy had
last week announced in the State Assembly
that the Government would bring in
practical changes to the liquor policy considering the concerns about its impact on
the tourism sector and the anxieties about
possible job-loss among the employees of
the bars that were to be closed.
However, Chandy had said that there
would be no change in the basics of the
policy. Criticism had come up from several quarters including the State Cabinet
itself that the liquor policy envisaging total
liquor ban and declaration of Sundays as
no-booze days would have serious impact
on the tourism and IT sectors.

]PcX^]&

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t least 26 influential people,

mostly belonging to the
ruling political class of Bengal
and some civil society members including film and teleproducers, are in the CBI cross
hairs for their alleged connection with the Saradha multicrore chit fund scam.
This apart, the CBI
probing the multicrore ponzi
deal, arguably
the biggest to
have taken place in
Independent India
affecting more
than 18 lakh people
are trying to solve
the mystery of about
10-12 bank accounts that
played a big role in the scam.
According to sources the
CBI has released 26 names in
its alert issued to the Airport
Authority of India (AAI) with
a clear apprehension that some
of these people might try to
leave the country.
Among these 26 people
there are former Central
Ministers, Members of
Parliament including one or two

women, a few State Ministers,

son of an ex-MLA all belonging to the ruling Trinamool
Congress. Apart from this, there
is a former MP and two politicians including a State secretariat member of the Opposition
CPI(M), sources said.
Those from the civil society
whose names have been released
to the AAI include a famous
painter close to the ruling outfit, a couple of film and television producers also seen
more often than not with
the top politicians of the
Trinamool Congress,
sources have said.
On why the
Agency alerted the AAI
instead of impounding
their passports sleuths
said the second options
was always available with
them but it the first option
was preferred because otherwise it would have alerted them
leading to some tampering of
evidences. Apart from this
though the CBI had irrefutable
evidences against most of them
they were trying to gather foolproof evidence against some
others before taking final action
sources said.

glare. The company belongs to

a State Minister. Another
account reveals how C60 lakh
per month was paid to jailed MP
Srinjoy Bose for a bare editorial input from his media company to Sens media channel.
Apart from this the overpriced sale of Shantanu Ghoshs
Global Automobiles barely
worth C50 crore was also under
CBI glare as was the large-scale
land deals in West Midnapore
and Vishnupur in South 24
Parganas. The whole mystery
seems to be closed in these 1012 accounts said insiders.
Meanwhile, State Transport
Minister Madan Mitra who was
earlier asked by the CBI to
appear before it on Thursday
rang them up on Wednesday
asking for more time. The CBI
has reportedly given him a days
time and he has been asked to
appear by 10 am on Friday.
The CBI sources said they
could ask him to explain the
EXRcX\b^UcWTBPaPSWPRWXcUd]SbRP\TgWXQXcS^Rd\T]cb^USXUUTaT]cRWXcUd]S^aVP]XbPcX^]bSdaX]VcWTXaaP[[h<PaRWc^B418
^UUXRTST\P]SX]VaTcda]^UcWTXa\^]ThX]:^[ZPcP^]FTS]TbSPh
?C8 recorded conversations allegedly between him and Sudipta Sen
The Agency was also focus- 12 accounts have a lot of myste- worth C16 lakh to Sen for a apart from his alleged visits to
the Saradha headquarters at
ing on 10-12 bank accounts rious dealings that have to be whopping C15 crore.
belonging to Saradha chief explained source said adding
The sale of a cement com- Midland Park from where he
Sudipta Sen and his company. one of these accounts show how pany worth a few lakhs for sev- reportedly collected some mysOut of 22-24 accounts these 10- an MP sold his media channel eral crores was also under CBI terious packets.

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Mumbai: In a U-turn from its earlier
stand to include Shiv Sena chief
Uddhav Thackeray in a panel to discuss construction of party patriarch Bal
Thackerays
memorial,
the
Maharashtra Government Resolution
(GR) has not included any political
leaders in the committee.
A committee has been
constituted under my leadership where we will be discussing the construction of a
memorial for late Balasaheb
Thackeray, Chief Secretary
Swadhin Kshatriya said.
Fadnavis, after paying tributes to Bal
Thackeray on his second death anniversary on November 17, had said that a
committee under the Chief Secretary will
be constituted to discuss construction of
a memorial suitable to Thackerays status and that Uddhav and leaders of other

political parties will be on the panel.

According to the GR issued by the
state government last week, the panel,
headed by Kshatriya, will have seven
other members. Additional and Deputy
Secretary of the General Administration
Department (GAD), Principle
Secretaries of the Urban
Development Department,
Brihanmumbai Municipal
Commissioner Sitaram
Kunte, Divisional Commissioner of Konkan region, and
Mumbai Commissioner
Rakesh Maria have been
included in the committee.
The Shiv Sena, downplaying the
Governments move of not appointing
a party leader in the panel, said a final
decision on green signal to the project
will only be taken after Uddhav gives
his opinion.
PTI

0=D?B70A<0Q 6DF070C8

entres decision to decriminalise suicide has a far reaching impact in the

C
North-East. The move has cheered the
people of Manipur as the people of the
State, in particular, and people of the
region are now hoping that human
rights activist Irom Chanu Sharmila will
now be released.
It may be mentioned here that the
Central Government has decided to
decriminalise attempt to suicide by
deleting Section 309 of the Indian
Penal Code from the statute book.
Union Minister of State for Home
Haribhai Parathibhai Chaudhary on
Wednesday said this while replying to a
question in Rajya Sabha and informed
the House that the Government had
decided to drop Section 309 from the IPC
after 18 States and four Union Territories

backed the recommendation of the Law

Commission of India in this regard.
He said that the Law Commission
of India, in its 210th Report, had recommended that Section 309 (attempt to
commit suicide) of IPC needs to be
effaced from the statute book. The
Centre has taken the decision after taking into consideration the views of 18
States and four Union Territory administrations, who had supported that
Section 309 of the IPC may be deleted.
We are hopeful now that Sharmila
will be released from jail. She is supposed to appear in the court next week
over her detention. This will add new
spirit to our movement against the
Armed Forces Special Powers Act
(AFSPA) and we are going to intensify our agitation against the draconian
law, said Irom Shinghajit, brother of
Irom Sharmila.

*XZDKDWL'KDNDEXVIODJJHGRIIIRUWULDOUXQ
0=D?B70A<0Q 6DF070C8

ssam PWD Minister Ajanta Neog

A
on Wednesday flagged-off the trial
run of the bus service between
Guwahati and Dhaka via Meghalaya.
The trial run, which saw the participation of 24 delegates including representatives from the Central
Government, Government of
Bangladesh and delegates of Assam and
Meghalaya Governments, aims at
assessing the route conditions, estimated
time of the journey and to ascertain
other technical parameters.
Today is a historic day as Assam
and Bangladesh have taken a step forward towards a new relationship. The
regular bus service between Assam and
Bangladesh will not only result in the
better relationship between the neighbours but will promote and enhance
trade and commerce, she said while
flagging-off the trial-run from the
Inter-State Bus Terminus at Boragaon
in Guwahati.
The road between the Assam and
Bangladesh was opened before

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Independence. However, it is a good

sign that Assam and Bangladesh have
realised the need to establish better relationship, she said.
The trial run is expected to conclude at Dhaka on Friday and delegation is expected to submit the report on
the details and feasibility of starting of
the regular bus services.
This will be in addition to two passenger bus services to Dhaka already
operating from Kolkata and Agartala.
Negotiations with Bangladesh for starting the bus services from Guwahati and
Shillong are underway from the past
several months.
The proposed bus service, which
will cover approximately 500 kms starting from Guwahati, will take the
Shillong- Dawki (Meghalaya)-Tamabil
(Bangladesh)-Sylhet-Dhaka route.
Joint Secretary (Home) of the
Bangladesh Government Sheikh Abdul
Ahad, expressed excitement on behalf of
the neighbouring country and said that
the bus service once launched regularly
will open up new vistas of opportunities
?C8 for both the contries.

88<0aPXbTbC!RaU^a
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?=BQ 60=378=060A

s part of its fund raising

activities, one of the presA
tigious business schools in the
country, Indian Institute of
Management, Ahmedabad
(IIM-A) has tied up with corporates and brought in a
funding of over C20 crore,
which will be spent towards
research in financial markets, infrastructure and entrepreneurship.
This is the second tranche
of fund-raising efforts from
IIM-A in 2014. Earlier this
year, the institute had
announced of commitment of
C16 crore from Government
and corporate bodies.
I am thankful to CRISIL
and ATS Infra for establishing
chairs in Financial Markets
and Infrastructure respectively. SAPs desire to foster
the spirit of entrepreneurship
is in line with IIM-As longterm goals, and we are delighted to partner with them. The
contribution of these companies will help the institute to
strengthen its impact and
maintain its quality. As we

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:D<0A274;;0??0=Q
274==08

hile the corporate sector

which gobbles up the
W
entire Foreign Direct
Investment and 51 per cent of
the lending by banks, its contribution to the countrys GDP
is a mere 15 per cent, according to S Gurumurthy, leading
chartered accountant and
social activist.
It is the 2,500 industrial
clusters in the unorganised
sector spread across the countr y from Ludhiana to
Kanyakumari and Morvi to
Manipur which sustains the
economy of the nation. But
what they get in return is a
mere 4 per cent of their loan
requirements,
said
Gurumurthy while delivering
the inaugural bi-monthly lecture series on Indian economy
organised by Hindustan
Chamber of Commerce here
on late Monday.
Gurumurthy, a much
sought after corporate advisor, pointed out that one need
not go to IITs or IIMs or any
foreign management schools
to devise and strategise Indian
economy. Economic policies
of India could be formed
only by those who has known
the psyche of the Indian
mind, especially the strong
family bond existing in the
country, he said.
The economics being
taught in Indian schools and
colleges were prepared by the
westerners who were ignorant
of the mind of the people in our
country, especially those in
the villages. Ours is a society in
which the families take care of
the aged, infirm and children.
Instead of the Government, it
is families which ensure the
well being of the people in
India. But in western countries,
it is the Governments which
take care of the families which
has resulted in the destruction
of families. Families are being
nationalised
by
the
Government
even
as
Governments are getting privatised, said Gurumurthy.
Commenting on the State
of
Indian
economy,
Gurumurthy said any eco-

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nomic reforms being planned

by the Centre should be compatible with Indian thoughts.
Our society and its people
have concern about their near
and dear ones. The top priority of Indians is to take care of
the aged members and children
of the family. This has led to an
increase in the personal savings
of individuals. They are not
greedy and never stake their
hard earned money on stocks.
While more than 60 per cent of
the US population are hooked
to stock markets, only one per
cent of the Indian population
have stakes in the share market, he said and added that a
buoyant stock market is no sign
of a strong economy.
Gurumurthy recounted the
results of a recent survey held
mong women teachers who
teach economics and management in various colleges and
universities in Tamil Nadu.
More than 50 per cent said
they prefer to save their money
in banks. Real estate and housing was the second most preferred option while gold came
a third. Only one per cent of the
participants said they invest in
stock markets. When asked
why they prefer conventional
saving routes even as they teach
about the vast opportunities of
stock markets, they told us
that what is written in economic
and management text books are
only for examination purposes,
said Gurumurthy.

continue to connect with

practice, I am confident the
institute will benefit from
access to current management practices and challenges;
and also support for highquality research, said Ashish
Nanda, Director, IIM-A.
Over the last few years
SAP has been instrumental in
accelerating the growth of
social enterprises through their
capacity building, mentorship,
and technology donation. This
SAP Faculty Fellow furthers
SAPs vision and mission of
fostering social entrepreneurs
to bolster a sustainable and
inclusive economic environment in India.

#"dV_eV_TVU
e`]ZWVW`cE5A
_VeRd^fcUVc
Hyderabad: Twenty one
people were on Wednesday
sentenced to life imprisonment by a court in Kurnool
district of Andhra Pradesh in
connection with the sensational murder of TDP leader
Palegar
Kappatralla
Venkatappa Naidu and 10
others in May 2008.
The Sessions court in
Adoni town of Kurnool
acquitted 25 others in the
murder case. Forty-six
persons figured in the
accused list, a senior police
officer said.
The court convicted 21
persons out of which three
convicts died during trial and
one convict Diwakar Naidu is
absconding,
Deputy
Superintendent of Police,
Adoni (Sub-Division) BR
Sreenivasulu told PTI.
Prime
accused
Madduleti Naidu and Varam
Padmakka were among those
who were convicted, another police officer said, adding
after the courts verdict, 17
convicted persons were taken
into police custody.
PTI

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he gap between the
expectation and the pace
of economic reform is
widening. Things are
not moving fast enough
and there is no clear-cut road map.
Small administrative and economic improvements have kept coming,
but these have only acted as appetisers for the main meal to come.
The Government as a whole seems
to pause and mark time when
Prime Minister Narendra Modi
goes abroad on bilateral and summit meetings, or is out campaigning for the Assemblies. And the
Prime Minister has been doing a lot
of this rather than attending to governance himself over these
first few months.
There are successes to count:
Handsome pledges of investment
and cooperation from several
important nations; US President
Barack Obama accepting the invitation to be the chief guest at
Republic Day 2015; Chinese
President Xi Jinpings visit;
Australian Prime Minister Tony
Abbots visit; and now Russian
President Vladimir Putins visit,
amongst a number of other creditable foreign affairs wins. On the
electoral front, wins in Haryana and
Maharashtra and good possibilities
in Jharkhand, Jammu & Kashmir,
and in the municipal and local body
elections in Kolkata, are indeed substantial achievements. But, what
about the crucial reforms agenda,
and the improved day-to-day
running of the Government?
What about those slogans about
precisely these?
There is a sureness about Mr
Modi during the electioneering
and the foreign initiatives, that
goes missing and becomes hesitant when it comes to recasting
the nations economic possibilities. Here the Prime Minister
seems to be influenced by various
political and bureaucratic inputs
and is unable to put his bold and
visionary stamp on the proceedings. For a Government that is
pyramided to the top for almost
every important decision, this is
an impediment to progress.
Everything Mr Modi does
personally is still perceived as
potentially high-value, but his
Government, or indeed governance, has not made any big
impact on the minds of the people so far. This is creating frustration and disillusionment amongst
the BJP supporters and re-energising the once flattened
Opposition. The activity in
Parliament too is disappointing
and as chaotic as in the UPA days
of coalitions. Some inexperi-

enced first-time Ministers and

fringe elements in the Sangh
parivar create unnecessary distractions, offering ready ammunition to the Opposition. And
there seems to be no effective
mechanism to monitor or control
what they say and do.
The litmus test of how all this
is to go forward will be the content of the Budget in February
2015 it needs to establish a
milestone for the new India that
has been promised. If it fails to do
so, peoples patience with this
Government will certainly begin
to run out.
In the stock markets, till
recently, before the latest correction began to set in, most shares
were trading at 17 or 18 times
their earnings. They were doing
so in anticipation of the action of
the Modi Government to follow.
They looked over-valued against
actual corporate earnings all the
while, but not if compared to the
25 times prevailing in late 2007.
But those 25 times earnings
in 2007 were by way of irrational
exuberance, and a lot of money
flooding in via the FIIs in the
context of a global bull run.

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These 18 times now also expect

to go to 25 times; but based on
solid company earnings in real
terms. But with the currently rich
valuations, many foreign brokerages are beginning to fight shy,
preferring other, cheaper,
markets elsewhere.
China, even a slowed down
China, has size in its favour too, and
has beaten down stock valuations
today. And at a projected seven per
cent growth figure in terms of GDP,
it may be the more attractive
investment destination. Indias
dream run as the best performer
amongst the emerging markets
may turn out to be an altogether
brief season. The amount of FII
money coming into India could
diminish in future, perhaps being
cut to half, or less. This may have
already begun, though a major
'weighting' review will take place
based on both the legislative success of items such as the GST and
the insurance legislation being
processed in Parliament, the international ratings for India in the new
year, and the reforms content of
Budget 2015.
Meanwhile, there is a clamour
for a significant correction, of at

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least 10 per cent to 15 per cent, in

stock prices, in order to make it
attractive. Of course, the FIIs, who
control the Indian market, with
their grip on some 22 per cent of all
the floating stock, can engineer this
quite easily. They seem all set to do
so,taking it down in order to push
it back up again to 35,000 on the
Sensex, by the end of 2015. A reason why this sort of rank manipulation is possible, is because the FIIs
invest much bigger sums as influencers, and because the markets
have run up, not on hard news but
on favourable expectation.
At present levels, real earnings have to grow to sustain the
bull run. This can only happen
if the economy picks up substantially. For this, the Government
must make a number of bold
reforms. Why this first majority Government in 30 years that
needs a buoyant stock market for
its own disinvestment programme, is being so cautious, to
the point of exasperating business and industry, is indeed difficult to fathom.
Small incremental improvements of the kind that has
become routine, can possibly
take the GDP to 6.5 per cent per
annum. This may be creditable
when compared to the dismal
low of 4.5 per cent that this
Government inherited, but the
job creation and alleviation of
poverty needs upwards of eight
per cent for several years ahead
on the trot. Such growth cannot
be generated from the small
incremental moves.
The GST, the insurance Bill,
land and labour law reform, are
all emblematic of the yearning for
change. But, along with such
legislative initiatives, there have to
be changes in the way the young
see their possibilities these several months down the line. It was
very exhilarating listening to the
campaign promises, but the reality today, while not bad, mainly
on the back of the spectacular fall
in oil prices, rather than any
Government action, cannot yet be
declared as good.
And despite the number of
Assembly elections the ModiShah duo may win now, that second term can only come if the
people are satisfied that their aspirations too are being met.
Controlling more of the States
and, eventually, most of the seats
in the Rajya Sabha, may provide
the mechanics of a sustained
stint in power. But it cannot
substitute for the widespread
feeling that this Government is
not living up to its promise.

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;4CC4ABC>C74438C>A
C`UQ[e^YdUT\i
Sir This refers to two Union
Ministers talking in different
tones on the aspect of banning
app-based taxi services. It is a violation of the principle of collective responsibility. It was not
proper for Mr Nitin Gadkari to
give an opinion contrary to what
Mr Rajnath Singh offered
in Parliament.
Otherwise also, it was illogical for Mr Gadkari to compare
taxis with trains and airplanes over
incidents of rape. While there are
sufficient numbers of co-passengers in planes and trains, which
serve as a safeguard against rape
or molestation, this is not the case
with taxi services.
SC Agrawal
Delhi

4U\QiUTZecdYSU
Sir The existing laws on rape
are weak, which is why we have
not been able to curb the numerous cases of sexual assaults on
women. Perhaps the most
uncomfortable procedure in the
investigation of such cases is the
identification parade. In most
cases, the survivor finds it difficult to identify the accused

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after the horrible experience

she has faced. Moreover, the case
drags on for years, leaving the
victim despondent.
Cases of sexual molestation
should preferably be tried by
women judges, to ensure sensitivity. The men who commit such
gruesome acts are frustrated
human beings. Rapists are like
terrorists with a depraved mind.
They have no religion. Also, in
many cases, rape complaints are
covered up by the police for
various reasons.
Jubel DCruz
Mumbai

E^TUbdbYQ\c`\YWXd
Sir Reports that the number of
undertrials in Tihar jail is on the
rise, makes for disturbing reading.
There has been a 34 per cent
increase in the number of undertrials during the last four years.
Many of the undertrials are illiterates/semi-literates, and most of
them belong to the economically and socially weaker strata of the
society. Quite a few of them
could be innocent victims themselves, arrested on the basis of
mere suspicion, without an iota
of evidence. When these people
mingle with hardcore criminals,
they also transform into dreaded

criminals some day.

One of the reasons for the
large number of undertrials is that
these people do not have the
means to fight their cases effectively, and they fail to follow the
cases since proceedings are generally in the English language.
People in authority appear to forget the basic principle that language is for communication and
that appropriate language should
be used, which is understood by
the litigants. It is high time we
conduct the court proceedings in
the local language, especially in
the lower courts.
While Tihar tops in the number of undertrials in the country,
the situation in other jails of the
country is no better. Many undertrials remain behind bars for several years as they do not have the
money to fight their case or a person to stand surety for bail. It is
paradoxical that while thousands
of undertrials are languishing in
various jails for years together,
people who have committed serious crimes and amassed ill-gotten
wealth, are freely moving in society because they have been able to
afford the best legal help.
E M Adithyan
Edapal
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he Russian Ambassador in
New Delhi aptly described
Russia as Indias all-weather
friend. A friend, indeed,
Russia may be, but Indias ties
to the Eurasian behemoth are slowly
shaping into the contours of another
foreign policy quandary, as New Delhi
welcomes President Vladimir Putins
visit. Russias growing acceptance of its
strategic necessity to work with China
in the light of Western sanctions,
threatens to upset the delicate balance
of Asian security.
Indias relation with Russia has been
one of its foreign policy successes in the
past decade. Markedly uncelebrated, it
hinges on the quiet and consistent,
rooted in a multi-decade long defence
cooperation, which has expanded to
other areas including security, trade and
economics. This relationship was built on
the goodwill that accompanied the two
countries bonhomie in Soviet times. But
things are a far cry from the early years
of the millennium, when Mr Putin first
came into power and went about resetting once-fabled ties that had died a slow
and painful death in the Yeltsin years.
India is, and has been, well represented in Moscow in the recent past. The
Ministry of External Affairs has employed
experienced Russian hands, who understand the intricacies of dealing with a
Russian elite who yearn for past glory; this
understanding has ensured that Indias
agenda with Russia has been achieved.
Yet, all is not hunky-dory between the
two, as Russias beholden to China is bad
news for India.
Westerns sanctions in response to
Russias involvement in eastern Ukraine
have steered Russia into Chinas open
arms. The two countries inked major deals
over the summer, including a landmark
$450 billion deal to move natural gas from

western Siberia to China. Chinese Prime

Minister Li Keqiangs visit to Moscow in
October only served to cement the evergrowing importance of that
relationship,during which a $60 billion
rail-link from Moscow to Beijing was set
in motion, along with major agreements
on currency swaps and the avoidance of
double-taxation.
The recently concluded Asia-Pacific
Economic Cooperation summit saw Mr
Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping
build on the gas deal with an additional
accord, and a mid-November visit from
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu
to shore up military cooperation was the
icing on the cake in a watershed year of
cooperation for the two countries.
India, for years, has drawn upon
Russian succour, in an effort to balance
its relations with the worlds other powers. The Cold War saw India and the
Soviet Union emerge as unlikely allies on
a number of issues including Afghanistan,
the Suez Crisis, and, most important,
China. Smarting from defeat in 1962 in
the China-India War, India hedged its bets
well, working with the Soviet Union and
its successor, Russia, to secure its international future even when the West turned
against it on issues like Kashmir and its
nuclear tests of 1974 and 1998.
Both the countries also shared apprehensions about an expansionist China, a
country with which they share extensive
borders, and with which both had fought
limited wars. The result was a strategic
partnership, which helped India to weather Chinas support of Pakistan and its continued intransigence, and allowed the two
to work together in the face of Chinas ever
increasing economic heft.
Today, apprehensions about an
expansionist China have diminished in
Russia, as Mr Putin seeks common
ground with the country in light of

increased Western isolation. For India, the

misgivings prevail, though they take
another form. Indias trade ties with
Beijing are vital to its economic future, yet
it continues to squabble with China over
a long-standing boundary dispute.
And Chinas support of Pakistan flies
in the face of the countries bilateral trade
relationship. It is clear that a large amount
of mistrust exists between the two Asian
states. Indias recent outmanoeuvring of
a proposed rise in Chinas status at the
South Asian Association for Regional
Cooperation summit, goes hand-in-hand
with Indias limited progress within the
Shanghai Cooperation Organisation
grouping, through which it seeks to
improve access to and trade with Central
Asia. Chinas presence in Indias neighborhood is equally troubling to it, as it fendsoff blows in the Indian Ocean by seeking
alliances with Vietnam, Australia, and
Japan. While Russia served as the bulwark
of its attempts to balance China in the past,
India may no longer be able to count on
that option.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra
Modi has been bold and pragmatic in his
foreign policy since he came to power in
May. He has hosted both Mr Xi and
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and
has also visited Australia and the United
States in his six months at the countrys
helm. The deals he has signed and the relationships he has built have been a significant departure from the low profile of the
previous establishment, which did not
enjoy the same domestic support.
So far, Mr Modi has pursued a
mature multi-vectored policy keeping
with Indias international aims. Yet, it
seems that a pro-US tilt is emerging.
Deals with Vietnam, Australia, and
Japan, all significant allies of the US, and
US President Barrack Obamas return
visit to Delhi, planned in January 2015

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ast week saw a landmark
development
as
Bangalore and Chennai
made it into the 100 resilient
cities network. The announcement of the incorporation of 35
new cities was made at the
Rockefeller Foundations Urban
Resilience Summit in Singapore.
Significantly, the two
Indian cities were chosen
among 331 applications from
cities around the world for the
100 resilient cities network,
pioneered by the Rockefeller
Foundation, New York.
The 100 resilient cities
network is dedicated to help
cities around the world so
that they become more robust
to physical, social and economic challenges, and to
demonstrate a commitment
to build their capacities in
tackling 21st century issues.
The applicant cities were
asked to present a clear and
compelling description of their

major resilience challenges and

how they were approaching
and planning for resilience to
decrease vulnerabilities.
Chennai was chosen for
developing benchmark disaster
response plans to protect lowlying coastal areas in the face
of a high flood risk. Bangalore
on the other hand was chosen
for its regular desilting projects
and public awareness campaigns implemented to combat
seasonal monsoon flooding.
Left unchecked, these natural
occurrences have the potential
to severely impact the citys
commerce and industry.
Resilience in the urban setting has become a much-talked
about concept and is on agenda of many forums across the
world. A citys state of resilience
can enable individuals, communities, institutions, businesses,
and systems to survive, adapt,
and grow no matter what kind
of chronic stresses and acute

shock they experience.

Chronic stresses comprises high unemployment, law
and order issues or inept public transport and it tends to
weaken the city structure. This
is made worse by acute shock
in the form of natural disasters.
Between 2000 and 2012,
natural disasters including
weather, health and seismic
events, caused damages worth
$1.7 trillion globally. The damages were related to direct
impact on infrastructure, communities and environment.
As a part of developing
resilience, it is crucial to
develop a proactive and integrated plan to address and
respond to challenges. Ideally,
the plan should be incorporated during the urban planning
phase, and should be a part of
a larger framework that
includes health of the community, environment, economy
and infrastructure of the city.

However, as much as it is
important to create an inherent resilience in the cities, it is
also critical to ensure that the
same is linked to sustainability. Resilience is often described
as the capability of a city to
bounce back to normalcy
from any disturbance.
It is essential that our city
develops the capacity to rebuild and recover in case of any
contingency but also ensure
that ecological perspective is
addressed in this process.
India can aim for the next
phase of urban resilience in the
form of social-ecological
resilience. This concept helps in
moving towards a future of system within the city that promotes sustainability and helps
in gradual phasing-out practices in city management that
do not account for the environment or optimisation of natural resources needed for the city.
In Indian context, an ideal

socio-ecological resilient city

must envision less land use,
water and energy consumption
and produce far less waste. The
city must also develop new
ways of becoming ecologically regenerative through watersensitive design, local food
systems, and biophilic landscape besides having transit
systems along all major corridors that are quicker and more
convenient than using a car.
Urbanisation is occurring
at an exceptional rate; by 2050,
three quarter of the worlds
population will live in urban
environment. The next 30
years will witness an unabated population growth amid
crumbling civic infrastructure
and diminishing food and
energy security. Given this
scenario, India will do well to
invest its efforts on evolving
cities that are able to consistently adapt to changing conditions by emerging from set-

for Indias Republic Day celebrations,

underscore this shift. If embraced effectively, Indians new foreign policy alignment with the US will enable India to
balance out China in a more effective
manner. But where does that leave
Indias ties with its all-weather friend?
Defence cooperation and weapons
purchases are cooling. Russia is no
longer Indias only major arms supplier.
The Indian decision to proceed with the
French-manufactured Rafale fighter purchase over the Russian-made Sukhoi earlier this year, is a testament to this diversification. An increasing reliance on
Israel and the United States for arms purchases also exemplifies the new direction
India is pursuing. But Russia is also
branching out. In mid-November, Mr
Shoigu visited Pakistan to build on military ties there the first such visit since
the collapse of the Soviet Union. This was
a telling rejoinder to India.
With relations between the West and
Russia at an all-time low and a potential
pro-US tilt in Indian foreign policy
emerging, how long will India be able to
remain silent on Russias presence in
Ukraine before it comes under pressure
from the West to take a stand?
Mr Modi will have to tread lightly in
the next few months. It is unlikely that
India will seek an outright alliance with
the United States; yet losing its all-weather friend to China, largely due to issues
out of its control, is a situation it will seek
to avoid. Given a choice of playing the
third leg in a Russia-China partnership or
taking an increased role within the US
Asia-Pacific strategy, India is going to have
to work assiduously to adhere to its ageold maxim of strategic autonomy.
(The writer is a lecturer on South Asian
politics at Charles University in Prague, and
a Visiting Fellow at the Institute of Defence
Studies and Analyses in New Delhi)

WKLQN

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:>C0BA8A09
backs and continuously establishing practices that account
for the environment.
India must identify the
challenges and threats early
and develop visions, feasible
strategies, spatial scenarios and
relevant tools that can guide its
cities to address pressing issues
such as climate change adaptation and mitigation, natural
resources shortage and unsustainable urban growth.
To enable this, mindset
needs to be changed, which
can be facilitated by adaptive
governance and collaborative
decision-making. Government
must also encourage and
empower local communities
to make their own climate
change and natural resource
use strategy.
This power to the grassroots level will drive the change
and surely help pave way for
establishing socio-ecological
resilience for the cities.

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overnment is looking to
give away 112 mines in the
G
second phase of its ambitious eauction of deallocated coal mines
once the first phase consisting of
auctioning off as well as allotment of 92 blocks gets completed by March 2015. For this purpose the necessary clearances
need to be put in place, Coal
Secretary Anil Swarup said on
Wednesday.
His comments came on a
day when the Government
introduced the Coal Mines
(Special Provisions) Bill 2014 in
Lok Sabha which entails e-auction of cancelled coal blocks.
"We are toying with the
idea whether we can first get
clearances of the coal blocks
(around 112 mines) and then
hand them over," Swarup said at
an interactive session organised
by industry body Assocham.
The cleared blocks will fetch

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the government more money,
he added.
The Government had earlier cancelled the auction of
three coal blocks stating that
issues related to certain clearances need to be "revisited".
In the first phase, the Coal
Ministry will auction or allot
92 of the 204 blocks that were
cancelled by the Supreme
Court in September. The sale
process for these mines will

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old prices on Wednesday

soared by C650 to C27,470
G
per ten gram in the bullion mar-

start on February 11.

The Secretary further said
that work on the 112 mines
will immediately start after the
Government allots or allocates the 92 mines.
"We will immediately
work on the rest of the mines
(112) after these mines (92
mines in the first lot). In fact,
we will start working on it
from 22nd of December," he
said.

C`USYQ\@b_fYcY_^c2Y\\" !$Y^<_[CQRXQ
he Government on Wednesday introduced
in the Lok Sabha, a bill seeking to replace
the coal blocks allocation ordinance that
unveiled the NDA Government's ambitious coal
sector reforms.
The Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Bill
2014 was introduced by Coal Minister Piyush
Goyal, who insisted that the bill did not seek denationalisation of coal mines.
The bill was opposed at the admission stage

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ket here on strong seasonal

demand and firm trends in
global markets.
Silver also rose sharply by
C1,600 to C38,400 per kg on
increased offtake by industrial
units and coin makers.
A fall in rupee value against
the US dollar and increased
buying by jewellers and retailers amid ongoing wedding season lifted prices of the precious
metal, bullion traders said. A
cheaper rupee makes imports of
the metal costlier.
The rupee was trading weak
at 62.05 against the US dollar at
the forex market.
Gold surged over $ 28 to a
six-week high of $1,238.32 an
ounce in New York on Tuesday
as weakening of the dollar and
retreat in global equities raised
demand for the bullion as an
alternative investment.
Silver also surged 5.2 per
cent to $17.12 an ounce in

itself by Saugata Roy (TMC) who said it was

aimed at de-nationalisation of coal mines,
which were nationalised way back in 1973.
Supported by the Left parties, he said the legislation nullified the Coal Mines Nationalisation
Act of 1973 and allowed "total exploitation" of
the mines and the people of the country.
The Minister said the bill had been brought
in the wake of the Supreme Court decision cancelling 204 coal blocks on September 24 and
resetting the agenda of coal block allocation, cancelling the allocation of these blocks.

2T]caTc^aT[TPbTC
?=BQ=4F34;78

day ahead of his meeting

with state finance minisA
ters, Union Finance Minister
Arun Jaitley on Wednesday
said the government will soon
release Rs 11,000 crore towards
Central Sales Tax (CST) com-

New York on Tuesday.In Delhi,

gold of 99.9 and 99.5 per cent
purity zoomed up by C 650 each
to C 27,470 and C27,270 per ten
grams respectively. It had gained

C170 on Tuesday.Sovereign traded C100 higher at C23,800 per

piece of eight gram. Following
gold, silver ready spurted by
C1,600 to Rs 38,400 per kg and

Ra^aT2BCR^\_T]bPcX^]c^bcPcTb)5<
pensation, as part of consensus
building for GST rollout.
"...Despite difficult and
challenging situation, I propose to release about Rs 11,000
crore, which is one-third, this
year as a part payment as a
CST compensation to the
states," he said replying to a

debate on Supplementary
Demand for Grants in the
Lok Sabha.
CST compensation is one
sticky issue that has been holding up agreement on introduction of the Goods and
Services Tax (GST) regime to
replace all indirect taxes.

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?C8Q =4F34;78

nfosys CEO Vishal Sikka on

Wednesday said the founders of
IIndia's
second largest IT services firm
Infosys still remain committed to the
firm and the sold stock will be used
for philanthropic purposes.
Earlier this week, co-founders N
R Narayana Murthy and Nandan
Nilekani along with their family
members sold Infosys shares worth Rs
6,484 crore.
Following the sale, shares of the
Bangalore-based firm fell nearly 5 per
cent, wiping out Rs 11,611 crore from
its market valuation.
"It was long overdue, I think it
was part of a portfolio decision.
The vast majority of their holdings are still there, and they are still

among the largest shareholders of the

company," Sikka, the first nonfounder and outsider to lead Infosys,
said in an interview to an news channel.
The sale included 32.6 million
shares of Infosys.
"They are fully committed to the
management, to the company -- it's
all good," Sikka further added.
Infosys shares today closed marginally lower at Rs 1,963.70 from the
previous close on the BSE.
The sale was been done to partially monetise their stake, after more
than three decades of setting up the
company. Some portion of the proceeds will also be used by the founders
towards philanthropic activities.
"One key thing that people don't
know about Infosys is the massive
influence that Infosys has with regard
towards philanthropy. Infosys
Foundation, still headed by Mrs
Murthy, wife our founder. Its a huge
activity for us. It (the sale) was part
of philanthropic, giving, entrepreneurship. This was the reason for the
sale," he said.
Murthy and family sold 12 million shares (23.3 per cent of their
holding), Nilekani and family 12
million shares (31.3 per cent of their
holding), Dinesh and family 6.2 million shares (21.5 per cent of their
holding) and Kumari Shibulal 2.4 million shares (9.6 per cent of their holding

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ber may be in the midst of a

major controversy over a rape
U
incident in India, but Infosys' CEO
Vishal Sikka feels that digital services
like this app-based taxi provider have
huge potential in the country.
"The e-commerce services like
Uber, these have a huge opportunity
in India because there is a tremendous
embrace of the digital. It's a young
country, it's a young work force -- huge
opportunities (are) there," Sikka said.
The comments, made by Sikka
on Tuesday during a TV interview,
come at a time when Uber and other
such operators are facing a government crackdown and public outrage
after rape of a young woman last
Friday, allegedly by the driver of an
Uber cab. The driver is now in police
custody, while Uber services have
been already banned in Delhi, where
this incident took place, while it has
come to notice of the authorities that
such players were not registered to
offer taxi services.

weekly-based delivery by C1,815

to C38,615 per kg.Silver coins
shot up by C1,000 to C 63,000
for buying and C64,000 for
selling of 100 pieces

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;>=3>=) Gold fell from a
six-week high as investors
weighed expectations for
rising US interest rates
against a weaker dollar.
Gold slipped 0.4 per
cent to $1,226.33 an ounce.
On Tuesday, it reached
$1,238.32, the highest price
since October 23, as a weaker dollar and global stock
markets spurred demand
for a store of wealth.
Silver fell 0.4 per cent to
$17.00 an ounce.Meanwhile,
the Bloomberg dollar spot
index slipped for the third
day after reaching a five-year
high this week.
The Federal Reserve
meets next week as policy
makers debate the timing of
the first interest-rate
increase in eight years.
Rising rates cut golds allure
because bullion generally
offers investors returns only
through price gains, while
the precious metal typically moves inversely to the
greenback.
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he Reserve Bank of India

(RBI) would shortly come
T
out with guidelines on refinance
of existing projects as demanded by the industry, its deputy
governor S S Mundra said on
Wednesday.
"There is a demand from
the industry for refinance of
existing projects. RBI will come
out with the guidelines soon,"
Mundra said at a CII interaction
. He said new projects would get
the scope for refinance every five
years till the economic life of the
projects as already declared.
"But for existing projects,
the guidelines will be out soon,"
he said.
Sounding a word of caution
on big projects having thin equity, Mundra said, "There are many
projects based on thin equity.
This is like skating on thin ice."
He said that when economic growth is robust, such projects
carry on as many of the ills are
taken on stride.
"But when growth falters,
signs of early distress crop in ...
RBI is keeping a vigil on projects
which are having thin equity to
see whether there are signs of
early distress," Mundra said.
Ahead of the RBI central
board meeting here tomorrow,
Mundra said the regulator was

keeping its ears close to the

ground.
Mundra said, "We are at a
time when there is deflation,oil
and commodity prices are
down and food prices softening".
There is room for softening
of stance in the coming period,"
he said.But he gave a rider saying "some uncertainties will
always remain like the level of
inflation, how will it move."
Mundra said, "We are at a
time when there is deflation,oil
and commodity prices are
down and food prices softening".
"There is room for softening of stance in the coming
period," he said.
But he gave a rider saying
"some uncertainties will always
remain like the level of inflation,
how will it move."
Mundra said the entire
monetary policy of RBI was
based on five pillars.
He said more players would
be allowed in the market and
licenses to payments bank and
small finance bank would be
issued in March or April.
Inflation targetting was the
major issue with RBI for which
there is shift from wholesale
price index (WPI) to consumer price index (CPI), he
said.

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holds majority stake.

?=BQ =4F34;78

he Government on Wednesday
allowed public sector banks to raise
up to C1.60 lakh crore from markets by
diluting Government holding to 52 per
cent in phases so as to meet Basel III capital adequacy norms.
"The quantum of capital support
needed by banks is huge, which cannot
be funded by budgetary support alone,"
an official statement said, detailing the
decision taken by the Cabinet, headed by
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to allow
PSBs to raise equity capital from market.
The Cabinet asked the PSBs to
broadbase retail shareholding while going
in for the fund raising.
Out of 27 PSBs, Government of India
controls 22 through majority holding. In
the remaining 5 banks, state-run SBI

"If the PSBs are permitted to bring

down Government holding to 52 per cent
in a phased manner, they can raise up toC
1,60,825 crore from the market," it said.
The Basel III norms, which will come
into effect from March 31, 2019, were put
in place following the 2007-08 financial
crisis triggered by the fall of Lehman
Brothers.
The norms are aimed at improving
risk management and governance while
raising the banking sector's ability to
absorb financial and economic stress.As
per Basel-Ill norms, the minimum Tier1 has to be 7 per cent.
The total support provided to PSBs
towards capitalisation during the past four
years was C58,634 crore, the statement
said, adding the provision for the current year is at C 11,200 crore.

?=BQ =4F34;78

overnment has stated that

structural reforms are
G
necessary for achieving a sustainable growth of 7 per cent
to 8 per cent and for making
India a $5 trillion economy in
the next 12 years.
"If we take our $2 trillion
economy and get it on the sustainable 7-8 per cent growth
rate then we have a situation
when the economy doubles in
10 or 12 years to $4 trillion
economy. If rupee strengthens
we may end up getting closer
to $5 trillion economy,"
Minister of State for Finance
Jayant Sinha said on

Wednesday while addressing

the Delhi Economics
Conclave.
Sinha also made a strong
pitch for "deep structural
reforms" to achieve a sustainable and non-inflationary
growth of 7-8 per cent over
longer period of time.
"We also need to get the

economy up to a long term

growth rate of 7-8 per cent, it
will have ups and downs. But
ultimately long term growth
rate for the Indian economy
has to be 7-8 per cent," he
said.The minister said there
was a need to control inflation
at 4-6 per cent over the years.
Listing the priorities
before the government, he
said, there is a need to pursue
macroeconomic stability,
build world class infrastructure, unlock entrepreneurial
energy and put in place social
security system.Sinha also
made a case for supply side
revolution to enable the country dramatically increase its
growth potential.

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here has been a significant

increase of 50 per cent in
global wealth between 1992 and
2010, but it rose by only an
"anaemic" 6 per cent during
this period if measured in terms
of sustainable development.
According to the second
biennial Inclusive Wealth Report
(IWR) released on Wednesday,
worldwide GDP during 19922010 showed a gain of 50 per
cent.
However, when changes in
human capital, produced capital
and natural capital are considered together, global wealth rose
by an "anaemic" 6 per cent over
those years, it said.
The Inclusive Wealth Index
measures progress towards sustainability, combines changes in
human capital, natural capital
and produced capital.
In the USA, India and
China, for example, wealth measured by GDP from 1992-2010
rose 33 per cent, 155 per cent and
523 per cent respectively, the
report said.
When measures of natural,
human and manufactured capital are considered together, the
USA's Inclusive Wealth rose by
13 per cent,
India 16 per cent and China
47 per cent over that time, it
added.
The report further noted
that human capital, measured in
levels of education, skills and
abilities, grew just 8 per cent
overall worldwide between 1992
and 2010.
Natural capital such as
forests, sub-soil resources and
other ecosystems,declined by
about 30 per cent worldwide in
this period.
"Looking beyond GDP and
adopting an Inclusive Wealth

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oing a business of Rs 900

D
crore till November,
Bharatiya Mahila Bank (BMB)
is expecting to end the fiscal
with a turnover of about Rs
1,800 crore, a top Bank official
said today.
The bank, which was
started in November 2013,
ended with a turnover of about
Rs 190 crore in the first four
and half months of 2013-14
fiscal and is expected to touch
about Rs 1,800 crore in 201415, BMB Chairman and
Managing Director, Usha
Ananthasubramanian told
reporters .
On expansion, Usha said
the bank would touch 80
branches,
including
Coimbatore (which was
opened today) by the end of
this fiscal from 36 branches
now.
It is expected to have 150
branches by the next financial
year and cross 450 by 2020,
she added.
BMB would soon open
branches in Pune, Bhopal,

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Haridwar, Jamshedpur and
Nagpur, she said, adding
branches would also be
opened in Madurai and
Tiruchirapalli in Tamil Nadu,

shortly.
As part of encouraging
women to contribute to the
economic growth of India,
particularly through SME sec-

tor, the Bank is helping them

unleash their hidden talents by
developing and introducing
many women centric products, she said.
Asked about the need for
additional seed capital, she
said at present there was no
necessity but would think of it
later.
To a question on recovery
from women entrepreneurs,
Usha said "no deliquency and
so far recovery is good".
Ananthasubramanian said
BMB proposed to start a
Recurring Deposit scheme
'Komal Kali' by which a minimuim Rs 50 can be deposited in the name of a girl child,
till she attains the age of 15 or
18 years.
She said it was also proposed to enter into MOU with
Hindustan Lever for opening
its Lakme salons on the lines
of Naturals and Green Trends.
The bank has also drawn
out plans to have off-site
ATMs and mobile banking. It
has at present 1.1 lakh account
holders of whom 82 per cent
are women, she added.

Index internationally is central

to the post-2015 sustainable
development agenda being
negotiated within the UN
Sustainable Development
Goals," Partha Dasgupta, Chair
of the report's science advisory group, said.

2IIVKRUHGHEWPDUNHWV
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ating agency Fitch on
Wednesday said it expects
R
Indian corporates to increasingly

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n Indian portfolio manager been ordered to forA

feit over $300,000 to settle
charges filed by US Securities
and Exchange Commission
that she illegally tipped and
traded on insider information
concerning inernet company
Yahoo's earnings.
Reema Shah, 42, was
ordered by the US District
Court here to pay disgorgement of $388,807 plus prejudgement interest of $1,296
and was permanently
enjoined from any future violations of federal securities
laws.
Shah had pleaded guilty
in 2012 to securities fraud in
a parallel civil insider trading
case case.
Shah was at the time a
portfolio manager at an asset
management firm that managed billions of dollars in
mutual funds and a hedge
fund.
The SEC said that no
penalty would be imposed in
light of Shah's sentence in the
parallel criminal case and
her cooperation.
In the parallel criminal
action, Shah was sentenced to
two years of probation and
ordered to forfeit $11,751
and pay a $500,000 criminal
fine in October.
Shah has also consented
to a order barring her from
association with any invest-

ment adviser, broker, dealer,

municipal securities dealer or
transfer agent.
Manhattan's top federal
prosecutor Preet Bharara had
submitted in court that Shah
"provided extensive substantial assistance to the
Government in the investigation and prosecution of
other persons who committed federal offenses."
According to court documents, from at least January
2008 through July 2009,
Yahoo executive Robert Kwok
provided confidential information concerning Yahoo's
quarterly earnings and potential business transactions with
other companies to Shah who
then executed trades based on
the inside information.
Shah, however, began
cooperating with investigators
after
federal
agents
approached her in 2009.
Assistant US Attorney
Benjamin Naftalis said Shah
provided "important and useful" information about "criminal activities" at hedge fund
giant SAC Capital that helped
the government prosecute
the Steven Cohen-led company.
In court papers, the government said that Shah decided to "cooperate promptly"
with the government and
assisted "proactively" in the
government's covert investigation into insider trading
from 2009 to 2010.

?C8Q 64=4E0

igh taxes on fuel and rising operating costs were

acting as a constraint to the
growth of the aviation industry in India, global airlines'
body IATA said on
Wednesday.
"High fuel taxes and
operating costs, coupled with
infrastructure constraints,
remains a challenge" for the
Indian aviation industry,
IATA Director General and
CEO Tony Tyler said here.
He was replying to a
question on the problems
facing the Indian aviation
sector.
Tyler, however, projected
a healthy outlook for the
global airline industry and
said IATA expected 25 per
cent growth in combined net
profit to $ 25 billion in 2015
as against $ 19.9 in the current year on the back of
falling crude prices.
"For 2015, we see airlines
making a collective $25 billion net profit. That's up
from $19 billion this year, $
10.6 billion in 2013 and $ 6.1
billion in 2012," the chief of
the International Air
Transport Association
(IATA) said at the IATA
Global Media Day here.
However, half of the $ 25
billion profit was expected to
come from the North
American carriers while the
European airlines, were likely to contribute only $ 4 billion in the collective profits.
"I would like to impress
upon you that while $ 25 billion may sound like a lot of
money, it is distributed over
a very fragmented industry
with hundreds of players.
Some airlines are making
sustainable returns and others re struggling.
"Over half of the profits,
some $13.2 billion, are
expected to be generated by
the airlines in North
America. In contrast, the

?=BQ =4F34;78

access offshore debt markets to

meet their funding require-

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European industry is of similar size but will make only $
4," Tyler said
Tyler said it must be
recocgnised that a $ 25 billionprofit on revenue of $783
billion amounted to a net
profit margin of just 3.2 per
cent, adding that this was
"just a little better than the 3.1
per cent margin generated in
2010."
"On a per passenger
basis, the airlines will make
about $ 7.08," he said.
Stating that IATA has
noted an average crude oil
price in excess of $ 100 per
barrel since 2011 till this
year, he said the projection
for next year would see oil
averaging at $ 85 per barrel.
"That is more than double the 2004 price, yet somehow it now seems cheap!
There is no doubt that the
recent fall in oil price is a
relief for airlines," Tyler said.
Given all the risks in the
world today including the
political instability, economic uncertainty, public health
emergence and terrorism,
there is not much buffer to
absorb a significant change
for the worse in the operating environment, he said.
Terming the case of gunning down of the Malaysian
passenger plane MH-370 as
"outrageous", Tyler said civilian aircraft should never be
made a "military target""

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ments.
The offshore bond issuances by non-financial Indian corporates is estimated to have crossed $ 13 billion so far in 2014
as against around $ 9 billion in 2013.
"The offshore capital markets are increasingly attractive to
Indian corporates partly because of better pricing for their bonds,"
Fitch Ratings said in a statement.
The growth in access to bond market is likely to be driven
by the need to refinance debt and fund capex once the investment cycle restarts, it added.
The offshore markets now present a relatively more cost-effective funding source as compared with onshore funding for Indian
corporates, it said.
Also the reduction of withholding tax on interest payments
of offshore bonds to 5 per cent with effect from July 2014, compared with 20 per cent earlier, has incentivised investment in such
instruments.
"Investor demand for Indian bonds has also been strong due
to expectations of improvement in Indian economic growth,
improved political stability and strong liquidity in global capital markets," Fitch added

+LJKWD[HVULVLQJFRVWVFKHFN

ipla on Wednesday
C
announced sale of its entire
48.22 per cent stake in Chinabased Jiangsu Cdymax
Pharmaceuticals for $18.5 million (over Rs 114 crore) as it seeks
to realign its global business.
The stake was held by Cipla's
Mauritius arm Meditab
Holdings, which has signed the
5TSTaP[ATbTaeT2WPXa9P]TcHT[[T]PccT]SbcWT1^PaS^U6^eTa]^ab^UcWT5TSTaP[ATbTaeTBhbcT\^_T]\TTcX]VPccWT5TSTaP[ATbTaeT1dX[SX]VX]FPbWX]Vc^]c^SXbRdbb deal to sale the shares in Jiangsu
P_a^_^bP[c^TbcPQ[XbWaXbZQPbTSRP_XcP[bdaRWPaVTbU^abhbcT\XRP[[hX\_^acP]cQP]ZW^[SX]VR^\_P]XTb
0? Cdymax Pharmaceuticals to an
affiliate of one of the other
shareholders of the Chinese
firm.
"Cipla had 48.22 per cent
well as the categories of home values, are willing to grow stake in Cdymax with an objec?=BQ =4F34;78
tive to pursue formulation
furnishing products sourced with us and
become world class suporld's largest furniture in India. Ikea today sources
05?Q B8=60?>A4
ret ailer Ike a on for EUR 315 million and pliers. We believe that many
Wednesday announced a new plans to double the sourcing suppliers will come from
initiative 'Make More in by 2020," the company said in other segments who are lookil prices fell in Asia on
ing to diversify their busiIndia' as it plans to double its a statement.
Wednesday as dealers
Ikea South Asia Head of ness."
sourcing from the country to
await the latest US supply
At present, Ikea has 48
about 630 million euro by Sourcing Sandeep Sanan said:
report for clues about pro"We believe there is tremen- suppliers in India with 45,000
2020.
duction levels, while weak
"The initiative is aimed at dous potential in India. We direct employees and about
Chinese and German trade
potential suppliers and to are looking for new suppliers 400,000 people in its extenddata also weighed, analysts
who share our vision and ed supply chain.
expand Ikea's supplier base as
said.
US benchmark West
Texas Intermediate for
January delivery slipped 90
cents to $ 62.92 while Brent
crude for January was down
USD 1.01 at USD 65.83 in
mid-morning trade.
"With the global supply glut, the main concern at
the moment is the level of
production in the US,"
Daniel Ang, investment analyst at Phillip Futures in
Singapore, told the news
agency.
"The US stockpiles
report will be in focus to see
if there is any change in production growth," he said.
Analysts surveyed by
the Wall Street Journal said
they expected domestic
inventories to have fallen by
2.7 million barrels in the
week to December 5.
The
American
Petroleum Institute, an
industry group, in its own
survey however said stockpiles likely rose 4.4 million
barrels.
It said refinery operations likely increased 1.6
percentage points to 94.6 per
cent of capacity.
The Department of
Energy will release the official stockpiles report later
Wednesday.
The department on
Tuesday modestly reduced
its 2015 US oil production
forecast to 9.3 million barrels
per day from the previous
9.4 million estimate.

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opportunities in China.
However, as per the new global
growth strategy, Cipla did not see
a strategic fit in these transactions
and hence decided to divest the
stake at a value of $18.5 million
which was the initial value of our
investment in the entity," said a
Cipla spokesperson.China is one
of the largest pharmaceutical
markets in the world and Cipla
is keen to be in the market to
offer affordable high quality
products, she added."We have
been observing a huge amount
of health awareness among the
public in China, and we believe
that there is a huge demand for
affordable drugs across various
therapies.

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he US Senate has confirmed

Richard Rahul Verma as the
T
next US Ambassador to
India. The 46-year-old
Verma will be the firstever Indian American
to occupy the post.
Senate Democrats,
at the prodding of the
White House, expedited
Vermas confirmation to
ensure that he was in the post
ahead of President Barack
Obamas visit next month to be
the chief guest at the Republic
Day celebrations.
A former Assistant
Secretary of State for Legislative
Affairs during President
Obamas first White House
term, Verma will be succeeding
Nancy Powell, who resigned in
March in the wake of the diplomatic rift over the Devyani
Khobragade episode. Holding
the fort at the US Embassy in

New Delhi has been Kathleen

Stephens as charge daffaires.
With the decks cleared for
Verma, efforts are now under
way for an early confirmation
vote for another key IndianAmerican nominee Dr Vivek
Murthy, chosen by President
Obama for the post of US
Surgeon General.
An alumnus of the
prestigious Yale and
Harvard universities,
the 37-year-old Murthy
was named by Obama
more than a year ago
for the post, but his
nomination has drawn
flak from the Senate
Republicans, who are irked not
only over his credentials as a
strong
supporter
of
Obamacare, but also for his
vigorous advocacy of gun control, including a ban on assault
weapons.
After a nomination hearing
in February this year, chances
of Murthys confirmation for
the job became increasingly
uncertain, because of fears that
the Republicans would go the
whole hog against Murthy in
the floor vote.

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fter an explosive indictment

of the CIAs torture practices
A
in the name of enhanced interrogation of detainees after the
9/11 terror attacks, a fierce political battle has erupted between
the Democrats and the
Republicans over the Senate
Intelligence Committees damning report released on Tuesday.
While President Barack
Obama promptly denounce the
extreme measures that the CIA
resorted to during the preceding
Bush era, former President
George W. Bush himself and his
deputy Dick Cheney rebutted the
findings, and Senate Republicans
came out with their own voluminous note of dissent.
The monumental report,
running into more than 6,000

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Dubai: Saudi Arabia has

approved a key agreement with
India aimed at protecting the
rights of Indian domestic workers, including maids, in the
Kingdom. The agreement aims
at organising the recruitment
process and controlling the
cost of recruitment in both
countries, according to the
Saudi Press Agency.
The meeting was chaired
by the countrys Crown Prince
Salman, deputy premier and
minister of defence. The
agreement aims to protect the
rights of domestic workers as
well as their employers and regulate the contractual relationship between the two parties,
Haj Minister and Acting
Information Minister Bandar
Hajjar said.
It stipulates that such
domestic labour shall have no
criminal records, be trained in
specialised centres in household
works and educated on the
Kingdoms customs and traditions as well as the terms and
conditions of the employment
contract, Hajjar said.
PTI

incident of honour killing, an eldercouple, who had a love marriage 55 years

Iago,nlyanother
was brutally killed along with four of their
children in Pakistans Punjab province, media
said on Wednesday. The cold-blooded murder
occurred in Malkana Mor area of Athara Hazari
tehsil of Jhang district on the intervening night
of Monday and Tuesday.
The couple, Ghulam Fatima, a widow and
Fazal Razzaq had had married some 55 years ago
without the consent of the womans family and
shifted to Jhang, Dawn online reported.
Following the marriage, the couple was
blessed with nine children and had been living
happily after but the tide of good fortunes turned
abruptly when the tragedy struck during the wee
hours of yesterday.
Police said a few days back, Fazal, Fatimas
son from her first marriage, had come to her
house in Jhang district and had been staying
there since then. He, apparently on Monday
night, spiked familys meal with some strong
tranquiliser drugs and the whole family fell
unconscious after partaking dinner. Fazal, who
was then allegedly joined by his five accomplices,
axed the couple and their three daughters from
23 to five years of age and an 11-year-old son.
Before fleeing, the suspects severely injured couples five other children. The incident came to
light next morning after neighbours came to the
house and informed the police.

pages, speaks not only of such

harsh practices as near drowning and rectal rehydration of
detainees, but goes on to say that
the CIA routinely misled the
White house and Congress about
its methods or the information
it obtained in the process.
Although many details have
been known for long, a declassified summary of the report discloses for the first time details of
all 119 prisoners held in CIA custody, with at least 26 of them held
because of mistaken identities or
bad intelligence.
Senator Dianne Feinstein,
head of the Democrat-controlled
Intelligence Committee, commented that the practices that the
CIA followed in the name of
enhanced interrogation techniques represented a stain on
our values and on our history.
Not only were they deeply flawed, but they often resulted in
fabricated information, she
said. The methods were more
brutal than what had been
acknowledged by the CIA to the
Bush administration officials.
Senate Republicans, who

had boycotted the committees

investigation, came out with
their 167-page response to the
majority findings. While pushing back against the committees
conclusions, the dissenting Republicans, led by Senator Saxby
Chambliss, said the CIAs detention and interrogation programme saved lives and played a
key role in weakening Al Qaeda.
President Obama, who cried
a halt to the CIA programme
when he took over from Bush,
said the Senate report reinforces
my long-held view that these
harsh methods were not only
inconsistent with our values as
nation, they did not serve our
broader counterterrorism efforts
or our national security interests.
Our nation did many
things right in those difficult
years. At the same time, some of
the actions were contrary to our
values. That is why I unequivocally banned torture when I
took office, because one of our
most effective tools in fighting
terrorism is staying true to our
ideals at home and abroad,
Obama said in a statement.

huck Hagel is the first

American defense secretary to visit Iraq since the US
officially ended its long war
three years ago.
And his message to Iraqi
leaders was plain: US military
power didnt solve Iraqs problems last
time, nor
will it now.
Hagel
says Iraqi
leaders and
the people of
Iraq know
that only
they can
bring lasting peace to their
country if they are resolved
to do it.
Hagel made the comments
on Tuesday after meeting Prime
Minister Haider al-Abadi and
other top Iraqi officials.
Hagel offered assurances
that Washington is committed
to helping Iraq regain the territory it lost to Islamic State
fighters this year, and he emphasised the importance of building an international coalition to
combat the extremist group.

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akistan's former military dictator Gen Pervez Musharraf

P
has said he believes in a tit-fortat policy on all fronts and
claimed that Kargil conflict was
in response to India's role in the
creation of Bangladesh.
The 71-year-old former
president, who masterminded
the Kargil conflict in 1999 and
ruled over Pakistan for nine
years, said that India had played
role in creating Bangladesh and
trying to seize Siachin. "They also
undertook such operations so
Kargil also happened," he told
Samaa TV channel.
"I believed in a tit-for-tat policy on all fronts," said Musharraf,
who was the chief of the
Pakistani army during the Kargil
conflict in 1999.
Musharraf, who is currently facing treason charges, said
that "friendship with India is
only possible on equal terms
and with both countries
respecting each other."
He said if India would take
one step towards friendship
Pakistan would respond by taking two steps forward.

"People think I don't want

friendship with India it is not
like that. Relations with India
were good in my tenure. We
were close to resolving major
disputes pertaining to Kashmir,
Sir Creek and water treaty,"
Musharraf said.
He said that friendship with
India was possible even with the
government of Prime Minister
Narendra Modi.
"We should have good relations with India even if Modi is
prime minister but not by bowing down to India or accepting
their aggression. If they continue in aggressive acts and proxy
acts then we can also respond in
similar fashion," he added.

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Colombo: Ahead of next months snap polls,
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on
Wednesday suffered another political setback
as he lost his governments two-thirds
majority in Parliament after two ministers
from parties representing Indian-origin
Tamils defected to the opposition. Palani
Digambaram and V Radhakrishnan, both
from parties representing Tamils of Indianorigin, said they were leaving the government
to side with the opposition unity candidate
Maithripala Sirisena.
Rajapaksa is seeking a record-third term after announcing snap polls set for
January 8. Rajapaksas ruling United Peoples
Freedom Alliance coalition had 161 seats in
the 225-member assembly. The tally now
stands at 149, a seat below the two-thirds parliamentary majority. Since calling the election, the Lankan president has suffered a loss
of 13 defections so far. Rajapaksa, however,
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has been able to gain the support of the main
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PTI

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he countless doctors, nurses and

caregivers at the forefront of battling
one of the worst ever outbreaks of the
deadly Ebola virus, were today collectively named as Time magazines 2014
Person of the Year.
The Ebola fighters have been awarded for their tireless acts of courage and
mercy and for risking, persisting, sacrificing and saving.
Times editors unveiled the winner of
the annual honour selecting the Ebola
fighters from an initial list of 50 world
leaders, business heads and recordbreaking artists that was narrowed down

to a shortlist of eight this week.

Ebola is a war, and a warning. The
global health system is nowhere close to
strong enough to keep us safe from infectious disease, and us means everyone, not
just those in faraway places where this is
one threat among many that claim lives
every day. The rest of the world can sleep
at night because a group of men and
women are willing to stand and fight. For
tireless acts of courage and mercy, for buying the world time to boost its defences,
for risking, for persisting, for sacrificing
and saving, the Ebola fighters are Times
2014 Person of the Year, Editor Nancy
Gibbs said explaining the publications reasoning behind the choice.

?C8Q 14898=6

fter a two-month jaunt in

the Chinese forests, a rare
Siberian tiger released into the
wild by Russian President
Vladimir Putin crossed back
into Russia, officials said on
Wednesday.
Heilongjiang
Provincial Forestry
Department received
information from the
Russian side that tracking devices showed the
tiger, Kuzya, was back in
Russia, State-run
Xinhua news agency
quoted an official from
the wildlife conservation department as saying.
Russian wildlife experts rescued five tiger cubs about two
years ago and Putin released
three of them in May.

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wandered into Jiayin County in

Heilongjiang in October, exploring an area as large as 2,200
square kilometres.
Kuzya is very likely to visit
China again as it marked the
areas he visited with his urine,
designating his territory, said Zhang
Minghai, vice director
of the State Forestry
Administrations Feline
Research Centre.
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forest ecosystem and
plenty of food, he said.
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avoid roads or human
habitats but never attacked
domestic animals, he said. An
estimate puts the number of
Siberian tigers left in the wild
at 600, less than 30 of those are
in China.

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Reggae is a popular genre in the

music circuit today. Why do you
think it took so much of time to come
to India?
Reggae is now popular all over the
world and during the 80s and 90s it was
at the peak of its popularity. But it could
not make its channel to India because
at that time there were very less or
rather no music channel or radio stations playing western music.

CWT^cWTa

bc^ah

Can you tell us about the first time

you heard reggae music. In what way
did that influence you?
The first time I heard reggae or
dancehall was when I was given an
Apache Indian cassette at the age of
eight. I also listened to other music genres such as hip hop and punk rock both
of which were heavily influenced by
reggae. Reggae music is very inspiring
and encouraging and that aspect developed my interest to pursue it full time.

3Tb_XcTSaPfX]VU[PZU^aRaX\TbPVPX]bcf^\T]3T[WXWPbQTT]
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espite being dubbed as the rape
capital and criticised for heinous
crimes against women, Delhi has
come up as the most favourite destination among domestic travellers.
The pristine beaches of Goa, snowy
mountains of Himachal Pradesh and glitz
and glamour of Mumbai were all
trumped by the national capital to top the
list of most favourite destinations in
India, according to a survey.
Conducted by by Wego, a travel
search site, the survey has declared New
Delhi as the most sought destination
within the country. Most of the users of
the portal are business travellers.
Mumbai is not far behind at second
on the list, while Goa, the destination for
all the party hoppers, got the third spot,
followed by Bangalore and Chennai
respectively.
Among international destinations,
Singapore has topped the list, while
Dubai is on the second spot.
Jackson Fernandez, managing director of the portal, feels that the airline flash
sales and expansion of routes will dominate 2015.

How and when was Reggae Rajahs

formed?
Reggae Rajahs was formed early
2009 in Delhi. We were looking for an
Indian word to go with the western
name of reggae. After a lot of brainstorming, Rajahs was the only word that
sounded nice and fit well with reggae.
Zorawar Shukla and I are the only ones
in the band right now.

He also feels that the new domestic

airlines and attractive discounts will
continue to add a zing to the aviation sector, while improvements in infrastructure
will also help the domestic travel market
grow.
The arrival of electronic visa (e-visa)
facility for tourists from 43 countries,
including US, Israel, Palestine and Japan
is also expected to boost tourism sector
next year.

2YWTY`

s many as 30 per cent of Bengali

A
moviegoers dont contemplate watching a Bengali film in a hall in near future

ythological tales and epics have

become a phenomenon of late,
M
thanks to the exponential success of Life
OKs Mahadev. So much so that the actors
who portray religious deities on screen
often find themselves flocked by devotees
at public places. After Mahadev, Life OK
has come up with yet another mythological show Mahakumbh. But the narrative
of the story is unique and has something
that has never been shown before, said
Gautam Rode, who plays Rudra (the central character of the show) during his
promotional visit to the city.
Looking dapper in a crisp white
shirt and leather jacket, the actor was
more than eager to share the difficulties that he had to go through before
shooting Mahakumbh. The character
of Rudra was extremely challenging
both physically and mentally, he said.
The fact that he had no one to refer
to for his character made it all the
more difficult for him. He added, I
used to sit with Arvind Babbal
(director) during what we used to
call a workshop and he used to narrate to me details about the character. I noted all the points down
and used to emulate them on my
own because the character was a
class apart from what I have ever
done. He had certain sitting pos-

What are the instruments that reggae music require?

The genre uses the same instruments as any rock bands guitar, bass
and drums. But what are essential in
reggae are a brass section and percussion.
Which has been your favourite city?
We have toured Peru, Panama,
New York City and Europe. Everywhere
we have received great response as people abroad know music a lot more than
in India.
The audience are always curious to
see how we play reggae and dancehall,
considering the fact that we are from
India.

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and 10 per cent have already stopped going

to the theatres in the last one year, reveals
a report titled Bengal Bioscope: A Big
Picture Outlook for Sustainable Growth.
Confederation of Indian Industry
(CII) partnered with IMRB International
in conducting a study on Bengali film
industry that focuses on understanding the
emerging business models, importance of
Internet and innovative viewer engagement
methods that are vital for the growth of the
industry.
As a part of the project, IMRB conducted a first-of-its-kind consumer survey
across eight districts in urban West Bengal
to learn the changing nature of film
viewership and the general perception of
Bengali films among its target audience.
Some of the other key findings of the
report are that majority of Bengali movie
viewers in Kolkata have not been to theatres in the last one year to watch a
Bengali film despite proliferation of
multiplexes. In the other districts, the frequency of visits are quite low, not even
three films in a year.
The study reveals that Bengali cinema today releases around a 100-odd films
every year and the total investment
pumped into the industry is pegged at
C150 and C180 crore.
The report will be launched at CII

Is India warming up to reggae

music?
Reggae is definitely creating a
change in the way Indians listen to
music now. I think it takes time
maybe years, for a new scene to set in.
But the younger generation has realised
that reggae and dub music are the roots
of most of the popular genres they listen such as dubstep, drum and bass,
EDM, trap or hip hop.

Share your experience of opening

for Snoop Dog concert in Delhi?
I grew up listening to Snoop Dogg

Big Picture Summit Vision Bengal,

2014. The event, which will take place
Friday and Saturday in Kolkata, of CII
will witness eminent personalities from
the regional cinema and industry.
Some of the events themes include
vision 2020: The roadmap for Bengal,
good content makes for good revenue
moving from the stereotype, and overcoming barriers
for television

as a kid. To open his concert was an

amazing experience.
Who have been your favourite reggae artists?
Damian Marley, Chronixx, Tarrus
Riley and Busy Signal are some of our
favourites. We are planning to bring
them all down to India and at some
point have a reggae festival with all of
them. We recently visited Jamaica and
were able to interview many of these
artists. We would also love it if they collaborated with us on original songs at
some point.
How was your performance at NH7
Weekender?
It was fun to play in Pune. Every
show of ours gets us better. Its challenging to keep the audience entertained for
hours.
Is it possible to fuse reggae music
with Indian traditional music?
It is not an impossible idea. Sufi and
qawwal music would fit well with the
spiritual side of reggae music.
How did you come up with your
online radio show Pressure Drop?
The radio show is about playing the
latest tracks in reggae and dancehall so
that people, who may not come to our
shows, can be still exposed to this
music. It can be downloaded as podcast
from our Soundcloud. We have listeners all over the world. Its a great medium to spread reggae music to India and
rest of the world.

in Bengal. Chandrajit Banerjee, director

general, CII, said in a statement: CIIs
vision is to take the Indian media and
entertainment sector towards achieving
$100 billion by 2020. Regional is the new
national and it fits well for the media and
entertainment sector. Our focus on
Bengal Bioscope as part of the CII Big
Picture Summit is a step in this direction.
In addition to the consumer survey,
a series of interviews were conducted to
understand the trade insights of the film
industry through in depth interactions
with producers, actors, directors, distributors, exhibitors and broadcasters of
Bengali cinema.
Hemant Mehta, senior vice president,
Media and Retail, IMRB International,
said: The study encompasses the key
constituents of the industry producers, creative artists, distributors- as well
the opinions of consumers who decide
the fate of the creative products.
80=B

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tures and different ways of reacting to
situations.
Gautam negated all theories of his
character possessing supernatural
powers. He is just blessed with natural power but yes, there is an animal strength in him. He has got a
pure heart and he does not think
twice before helping someone in
trouble or need. That is his strength
and he does not fear death because
he has spent his entire life in a
shamshan ghat, shared the actor
who has not yet visited the Kumbh
mela but plans to visit next year.
There were also a few speculations
about the significance of the mark
that the actor sports on his back in the
show. Gautam gladly cleared them and
explained that the mark plays a very pivotal part in Rudras life as well as in the
plot of the show. The mark, he said, is

something that the character is born with,

which hides the secret of the Mahakumbh.
It is a mark from God that identifies him
as the chosen one, which he will realise
quite later in the show. Gautam also
shared how the character grew up believing that the mark was curse due to which
he was separated from his parents during
the Kumbh mela and why all the people
that he loved either moved away from him
or left him. He added, That is a trauma
that he carries with him when he was
growing up. He will eventually become the
rakshak of Mahakumbh.
To break away from a lover boy image
in his last show Saraswatichandra to play
a mythological character was something
that Gautam had looked forward to. It
is difficult to get different roles on television. By the time I finish one project,
my character becomes so famous that
people cannot envision me in the skin of

another character. We should break that

myth and I have done exactly that with
Rudra, he said.
Mahakumbh will be broadcast in seasons. Out of the 120 episodes that are slotted for the first season, 30 have already
been shot. The script, dialogues and
scenes are locked for this season and we
will not be making any changes because
we are convinced that it will strike a chord
with the audience. What happens with
serials is that makers wait for the TRPs to
kick in and then they start making
changes in the plot, script, dialogues and
sometimes even the actors. That is where
the show begins to lose focus. Every show
is welcome till the time that they stick to
the story and they have their own conviction, he said.
Actors who have donned the role of
mythological characters in the past often
find it hard to shake off the image. But
Gautam has not felt any pressure of keeping the image of a character outside the
sets. I dont take pressure or keep expectations because then it becomes difficult
to concentrate. I cant think which show
I did last or which show we are replacing.
The only thing I am concentrating on is
my acting. As it is the role is tough so if
I start thinking about other things then
I will not be able to perform my best, the
actor rounded off.

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ocussing on a range of
ideas; from women issues,
education, vocational training, health and protect of girl
child before and after birth,
Bridges an NGO organised a
panel discussion in the capital
recently to fight patriarchy and
bridge all social barriers.
Minister of Women and Child
Welfare and the chief guest of
the occasion Maneka Gandhi
said, A great effort is being
taken up by NGO Bridges in
highlighting the issues that
plague the modern society. We
need to bridge the gaps. I con-

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gratulate them for their efforts

in organising this discussion
which brought forth possible
solutions as well.
Former AAP leader Shazia
Ilmi and the moderator of the
discussion said, We have to
fight patriarchy and not men.
There is a fine line between the
two. The recent incident where
a female executive was molested has brought many issues to
light.
The event was organised by
Nelofar Currimbhoy, president
of Shahnaz Husain Group and
chairperson of Bridges.

=VRc_eYc`fXYRce
n an endeavour to bring
cognisance to energy conIservation
at grass root level,
the Ministry of Power has
been organising painting
competition for school children under the national
awareness campaign in the
country. Painting competition for students would not
only make students aware
about the need of conserving
energy but at the same time
would educate and involve
their parents in the cause.
The Bureau of energy
Efficiency along with CPSUs
NTPC Limited, NHPC
Limited, PGCIL, BBMB,
SJVN Limited, NEEPCO,
PFC, THD C Limited,
NHDC Limited, CPRI, REC,
DVC coordinated the competition on all India basis.
The first, second and third
winners of the state level
painting competitions of category A have been invited to
participate in national level
painting.
The NTPC Ltd, coordinator and facilitator for
National Level Painting
Competition 2014, would
be organising two hour on
the spot painting competition for fourth, fifth and
sixth standard students
under category A tomorrow
at Power Management
Institute, Noida.

The three themes are

save energy, save money,
save the planet; energy conservation: key to all development and let us save electricity.
The eminent jury members duly nominated by the
Ministry of Power for the
evaluation have been invited
from all over India for the
selection of best 23 paintings
and select the national winners.
The winners would be
given a certificate and award
money by the chief guest of
award
function
on
December 14 at Vigyan
Bhawan.
The competition a
treat on visual art is held
at three stages namely school,
state and national level.
Students of the seventh,
eighth and ninth standards
are eligible to participate
under category B.
The competition aims to
motivate children towards
rational thinking about energy conservation and it offers
them a chance to explore
their creativity.
The painting competition also stimulates their
interest in learning more
about energy conservation
and enhances their recognition of the need to adopt it
in their own lives.

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two-day Taiwan Textile
A
Fair in South India 2014
was organised at Le Meridien
hotel.
The fair was organised by
the Bureau of Foreign Trade
(BOFT) and Taiwan Textile
Federation (TTF) and represented in South Asia by
Worldex India Exhibition and
Promotion Pvt Ltd.
The fair was inaugurated
by Guann-Jyh Lee, executive
director of the Taiwan
Economic and Cultural

9^X]cTUU^acb $PHOWLQJSRWRIFXOWXUH
he United
Department
T
C ommerce (US

States
of
D O C)
imposed Countervailing
Duty (CVD) on Indias
exports of hot-rolled carbon
steel flat products. India had
challenged the determinations made by the US DOC
in
various
investigations/reviews treating several programmes of
India as subsidy whereas
these programmes do not
confer any subsidy on the
Indian exporters. Various
provisions under challenge
were that of US Tariff Act
and the Code of Federal
Regulations as being inconsistent with the provisions of
WTO Subsidy Agreement
(ASCM). The panel report
was circulated on July 14 this
year.
Thereafter, India and the
US appealed before the
WTO Appellate Body (AB)
on various issues related to
the panels rulings. On
December 8, the AB published its report.
India has achieved a significant victory at the WTO
as the AB held that the
Countervailing Duty (CVD)
measures imposed by the
United States against certain
hot-rolled carbon steel flat
products are inconsistent
with various provisions of
the Agreement on Subsidies
and
C ounter vailing
Measures (ASCM). It will
definitely help the domestic
manufacturers who had
been suffering on account of
inconsistent practices by the
USDOC.
Under the US law,
cumulation of subsidised
imports and dumped
imports is mandated for the
participating countries to
arrive at the injury margin.
India challenged this measure as it has been impacting
the Countervailing Duty
investigations by the US
leading to exorbitant CVD
against India. The AB ruled,
in line with the panel ruling,
with a minor modification
and found that the USDOC
determination pursuant to
Section 1677(7)(G)(iii) is
as such inconsistent with
Article 15 of the ASCM.
It may be recollected
that the panel ruling on
inconsistency of the US
application of this measure
was not appealed by the US.
The implication of this ruling is that the US has to
amend its domestic law to be
WTO compliant and so far
as the pending and the
future CVD investigations
are concerned, the same
would be subject to challenge if cross-cumulation is
applied again. It has significant trade impact for India
as out of the current ten
products on which US has
imposed Countervailing
Duty, about seven products
suffer from the same inconsistency.
The AB has emphatically endorsed Indias position
that a Public S ector
Undertaking (PSU) shall be

treated as a public body

only when they possess governmental authority and discharge governmental functions.
This ruling would provide significant relief to
exporters who buy raw
materials from PSUs such as
SAIL or NMDC. The ruling
also has world-wide implications on how the WTO
disciplines on subsidies can
be applied against alleged
financial contributions from
state-owned enterprises.
The AB also agreed with
India that the United States
benefit methodology while
calculating the benefit in
the case of sale of iron ore by
NMDC is unfounded.
The AB confirmed the
panels reasoning that proxies indicating domestic
prices cannot be ignored in
determining benchmarks
under the ASCM.
The AB report is also
relevant with regard to a
number of other systemic
issues concerning the
implementation of ASCM.
For instance, on the
aspect of determining an
appropriate benchmark to
determine benefit, it has
now been clarified that
investigating authorities cannot presumptively reject
government-related prices
as relevant benchmarks; in
applying adverse inferences
against non-cooperating
parties, investigating authorities cannot arbitrarily
choose to apply any inference, but instead account for
all substantiated facts; and in
selecting one fact over
another in such cases, the
finding is to be supported by
reasoning and evaluation.
This AB ruling will usher in
transparency in the conduct
of investigations by all the
member countries.
Further, the AB has
ruled that investigating
authorities do not have the
unfettered right to add new
subsidies in the course of
reviews of existing CVD
measures.
Only new subsides that
are closely linked to subsidies examined earlier can be
added in a review proceeding.
This has significant systemic implications on the
United States practice of
indiscriminately including
new subsidies during annual administrative reviews.
India will actively monitor the implementation of
this ruling by the United
States in order to ensure that
the interests of Indian
exporters are fully protected.
Indias efforts in this dispute
show case its commitment to
ensuring a level playing field
for its industry.
India recognises with
appreciation the contribution made by various stakeholders including the
domestic industry, the law
firm and the various
departments who worked
in close coordination to
achieve this result.

1cdU`
VebdXUb

elhi Tourism in collaboration

with Department of Art, Culture
D
and Languages, has been organising

NGC Videsh Ltd has won

an Exploration Block
O
14TAR-R1 in New Zealand in

Dilli Haat Utsav, to usher in the cultural ambiance of Delhi. This festival
is marked by diverse cultural programmes and artists from institutions
like Sahitya Kala Parishad, Hindi
Academy, Urdu Academy, Sanskrit
Academy et al have enthralled visitors
every weekend since September 2014.
The 12th weekend of Dilli Haat Utsav
concluded with spectacular music
and dance performances at all three
Dilli Haats. Series of events lighted up
the weekend with Hasya Kavi
Sammelan at Dilli Haat INA, Saroja
Viadyanathan disciples dance performance at Dilli Haat Janak Puri,
Sahitya Kala Parishads folk dance at
Dilli Haat Pitampura along with other
dazzling presentations. Artists from
around the city were given an exclusive platform to perform and unveil
their talent. Performers of Himalaya
Arts from Hindi Academy mesmerised
the visitors with a cultural programme
at Dilli Haat INA, while Janak Puri
witnessed Sanskritik Geet-Sangeet by
Mani Kumari Jha and group from
Sanskrit Academy. The performers at
Dilli Haat Janak Puri sang the National
Anthem and continued with seven to
eight melodies including bhajans, sufi
sangeet and other patriotic songs.
The performers were teachers at DAV
school who have been performing at

such platforms since the past eight to

10 years. Dharmendra Kumari, secretary, Sanskrit Academy also attended
the cultural programmes. The weekend at all the three venues drew people in large numbers and charmed
them through an animated evening.
Delicious and delectable food
items from various regions in the
country were also served. An elaborate
presentation and sale of handicraft and
handlooms items accompanied to satisfy the shopping appetite of visitors.

Commission for Women

0=>C74A540C74A National
(NCW) signed a Memorandum

8=C7420?

nstitution of Engineers (India),

around 100 years old institution for
the engineering community of India
is awarding outstanding engineers in
the national convention every year.
This year Narendra Kumari Nanda,
director (Technical), NMDC Limited
has been awarded the Eminent
Engineers award in recognition of his
eminence and contribution to the profession of mining engineering at the
26th National convention of Mining
Engineers organised by The Institute
of Engineers (India) recently in
Bengaluru. The mining division board
of Institution
of Engineers
shortlisted five
out s t an d i ng
mining engineers of the
country and
Narendra
Kumari Nanda
was one of
them. This
includes
Director of
Mines Safety,
Bellary region and three others in different field of mining.
Narendra Kumari Nanda is a B
Tech (Mining) from ISM, Dhanbad
and Post-graduated in M Tech (by
research) from ISM, Dhanbad. He is
currently pursuing a doctorate degree
on utilisation of low grade iron ore
through mineral processing.
He joined NMDC in January
1989 and has worked for over 25 years
in various capacities. As a director, he
has immensely contributed towards
growth of NMDC.
His earlier achievements include
Eminent Engineer award, the IME
Journal Golden Jubilee award, Abheraj
Baldota Memorial Award of Mining
Engineer of the year in 2010, Steelies
2013 Award for excellence in project
management and SGAT Award of
Excellence, 2013.

Center (TECC) and Sean Tsai

of the Taiwan Textile
Federation. The event was
supported by the leading textile associations of India such
as the Confederation of
Indian Textile Industry (CITI)
and Textile Exporters
Association (TEA).
The fair also introduced
Indian manufacturers to new
product categories to develop
for the growing demand in the
domestic as well as export
market.

of Understanding (MoU) with

Administrative Staff College of India
(ASCI) recently for conducting the
situational analysis of women and
girls in the states of Odisha, West
Bengal, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamil
Nadu and Tripura. Lakshami B
signed the MoU on behalf of ASCI
while Sunita H Khurana, joint secretary, NCW signed it on behalf of
the Commission. According to the
MoU, NCW and ASCI will work
together for undertaking a study on
situational analysis of women and
girls in the states of Odisha, West
Bengal, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and
Tripura.
The study will aim at providing
a holistic picture of the status of
women and girls in these states so as
to evaluate the progress of development of women and girls and rec-

CWT]TTS^UcWTW^da

ommend ways and means for

strengthening them in the respective
states. The Commission will provide
the required funds and support for
the study.
The meeting for signing the

MoU was chaired by Lalitha

Kumaramanglam, chairperson of
NCW. Shamina Shafiq, Laldignliani
Sailo, member secretary and other
officials of the Commission were also
present.

5LJKWWR
HGXFDWLRQ

he National Institute of Open

Schooling (NIOS) is an
T
autonomous institution under the
Department of School Education and
Literacy, Ministry of HRD, which
imparts education through open and
distance mode and conducts secondary, senior secondary and vocational public examinations twice in a
year March-May and SeptemberNovember in the country. The
September-November 2014 public
examinations have been successfully
completed by the NIOS recently. About
1.40 lakh students appeared for the secondary examination and 1.60 students appeared for the senior secondary
examinations.
The NIOS has declared the result
of the senior secondary examinations
yesterday while the result of the secondary examination will be declared
tomorrow on the NIOS website.

APY]PcWBX]VW7^\T<X]XbcTaX]PdVdaPcTScWTQaP]RW^U>aXT]cP[1P]Z^U2^\\TaRTPc
1T]cXeX[[PVTX];dRZ]^fCWXbeX[[PVTWPbQTT]PS^_cTSQhcWT\X]XbcTad]STaBPP]bPS
0SPabW6aP\H^YP]P>]cWXb^RRPbX^]WTWP]STS^eTa[^P]bP]RcX^][TccTac^f^\T]
QT]TUXRXPaXTbX]cWT_aTbT]RT^U1Wd_X]STa=PhhPaP]SBdaTbW=?PcT[TgTRdcXeT
SXaTRc^ab^UcWTQP]Z

the Bidding Round Block Offer2014 by the government of

New Zealand. The bidding
round was launched in April
2014 offering five offshore and
three onshore release areas for
competitive bidding. ONGC
Videsh submitted bid for one
exploration block located in
the Taranaki offshore basin in
October 2014.
The exploration permit was
awarded by Simon Bridges,
Minister of Energy and
Resources, government of New
Zealand at a formal ceremony
recently held at Wellington in
the Parliament. The award signifies their entry into a new
country, taking its presence in
17 countries in 36 projects.
Narendra K Verma, MD
and CEO of ONGC Videsh
expressed satisfaction at the
outcome and stated that their
maiden entry into the hydrocarbon province of Taranaki offshore basin in New Zealand
shall provide an opportunity to
explore interesting hydrocarbon
potential in the region and act
as a foothold for greater participation in the far-east region.

0bPUTUTPc

garwal Packers & Movers Ltd

(APML) has been certified with
A
ISO 39001:2012 Road Transport
Safety (RTS) management system standards by international quality certification agency CDG Inspection Ltd.
They are the first organisation in India
to have obtained this prestigious certification under the household shifting
business. This certification puts them
on higher pedestal of initiatives that the
group has taken to reduce road accidents, notably among which is Driver
S eva Kendra at Dudu ( JaipurKishangarh national highway) in
Rajasthan. The group has set new
standards and benchmarks in taking
care of road safety measures.
In the last year, the group has taken
up several management objectives, in
the direction of improving safety performance during road dispatch of
household goods. The ISO: 39001:2012
certification is an accreditation that
provides assurance to the customers
and stakeholders of the multiple precautions being taken by them to ensure
safety in dispatching household goods
by road to various parts of the country
as well as the safety of humans who play
a pivotal role in delivering the goods to
their destination.
Agarwal Movers Group chairman
Ramesh Agarwal said, We have always
viewed road safety very seriously as
each life is important and is our responsibility, too. CSR is looked at from various angles. Very soon we are ready to
go ahead with a planned IPO which is
slated to hit the market by April 2016.
From our side, the preparations are
being done and we will use the IPO proceeds for capacity expansion and working capital requirements.
Over the last 27 years, Agarwal
Packers & Movers Ltd. has become a
company of national and international repute and has enormous credentials
to its name including the highest accolade being acknowledged in the Limca
Book of Records for the largest movers
of household goods in the country.

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named the honourary 13th

man before the match.
For the Indians, however,
aptain Michael Clarke
fought through pain to it was only frustration and
slam 128, while Steve Virat Kohli could barely hide
Smith also produced a career- his disappointment with his
best hundred against Indias bowlers, who just could not
hapless bowling attack as find their rhythm.
The three quick wickets
Australia piled up a mammoth
517 for seven to take control of picked up last evening had
the first Test on a rain-truncat- brought the visitors back into
ed second day, here Thursday. the game but the momentum
Clarke defied a back was quickly lost today when
injury, which had forced him Clarke and Smith put on 163
to leave the field yesterday, to runs for the seventh wicket,
notch up his 28th Test ton and scoring at a brisk rate.
Nearly four hours of crickcombined with Smith (162 not
out) to steer Australia to a et were lost on day two as
commanding position on a intermittent showers sent the
players off the field time and
stop-start day.
It was a frustrating day for again. The first break came in
the Indians as they leaked the morning session after the
runs and managed to garner first hours play.
Nearly the entire postjust one wicket at the far end
of play by getting rid of Clarke lunch session, barring 30 minwith debutant Karn Sharma utes, was lost thereafter. The
providing the breakthrough. umpires decided to do away
with the teaT h e
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break and
Indian pace
bowlers were
'2:181'(5 play the last
session of the
far from
impressive as 0ST[PXST X 1aXbQP]TX <T[Q^da]TX BhS]Th day for an
they bowled a poor line and extended three hours.
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length and seldom troubled
the Australians. Clarke, despite allow that either with another
the back injury, managed to delay meaning that only 40
play his shots effortlessly, pre- minutes were played late in the
sented too often by loose deliv- evening. Only 30.4 overs were
eries by a rather listless attack. possible on the day as a result
Smith, on the other hand, and Australia added 163 runs
continued his good form to as Smith and Clarke, who
clinch his fifth Test century struck 18 fours during his
and was undefeated on 162 163-ball stay, ran riot. Play was
when play was called off early called off due to bad light at six
due to fading light and rain in the evening then with Smith
interruptions. In all, there and Mitchell Johnson (0 not
were three rain interruptions out) the unbeaten batsmen at
during the day on which mere- the crease.
Indias miserable outing in
ly 30 overs could be bowled.
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ning high in the aftermath of day one as none of the bowlers
Phillip Hughes death and impressed. Mohammad Shami
BcTeT]B\XcW
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their hundreds to pay tributes make an impression on the
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DXYcYcRUcd`QSUQddQS[gUXQfU*9cXQ^d
=4F 34;78) Praising the Indian pace
quintet picked for the ongoing Test
series in Australia, speedster Ishant
Sharma said the present attack is the
best the national cricket team will possess in the near future.
After Bhuvneshwar Kumar was
ruled out of the first two Tests against
Australia due to injury, the team
management went ahead with
Mohammed Shami, Varun Aaron and
Ishant ahead of Umesh Yadav for the
first match. Ishant believes the new
pace batter y is well equipped.
According to me this is the best fast
bowling attack that India will probably have in the near future. I dont
think there is any upcoming bowler in
the fray who is capable of bowling 140plus regularly, Ishant told bcci.tv.
Along with pace you also need to
0?
have the understanding about your 8]SXP]_[PhTabfP[Z^UUcWTUXT[SPccWTT]S^U_[Ph^]FTS]TbSPh
the wicket to be so slow - in Australia
game, body and the ability to adapt
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and adjust according to the demand
that is not the case with this pitch. They
of the situation. That will give you 5>A1>F;4AB)584;38=62>027
Adelaide: 8]SXP\XVWcQT[TUcfXcWP\^d]cPX]
figured that out eventually and changed
more control over the ball. Pace with ^Uad]bc^R[X\QX]cWTUXabcCTbcQdcUXT[SX]V
their line of attack accordingly. They
control is a lethal combination. These R^PRWABaXSWPafPbR^]UXST]ccWPccWT
will learn with experience, he added.
things come only with experience and QPcb\T]fX[[\PZTd_U^acWTQ^f[Tab_^^a
Having played cricket all around the
our young pacers will get there soon, bW^fBaXSWPaVPeTRaTSXcc^0dbcaP[XPb
world in his seven-year-long career,
he added.
QPcb\T]U^a\PZX]VdbT^UPV^^SfXRZTc
Ishant gave his tips on bowling with a
While Shami and Aaron picked FT\dbcVXeTRaTSXcc^cWT0dbcaP[XP]
Kookaburra ball.
two wickets each on the opening day, QPcb\T]fW^R^d]cTaTScWTR^]SXcX^]bP]S
You have to figure out the batsthe opening bowling duo was guilty of cWTaTVd[PaaPX]QaTPZbCWTh\PSTV^^SdbT
letting away Day 1 centurion David ^UcWXbV^^SCTbcfXRZTcP]ScWThWPeT_dcd_ mans weakness, form a plan accordingly and keep at it constantly. If you know
Warner in the first spell. Ishant said the ad]b^]cWTQ^PaSbPXSBaXSWPaPUcTacWT
a batsman likes to play the cover drive,
youngsters will learn with time.
bTR^]SSPhFTWPS^da_[P]bP]ScaXTS
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Australia. They didnt have any first- b^\TcX\TbcWThS^]cCWTbZX__TaVPeTPeTah make him punch I off the back foot,
he said. And do it consistently. When
hand experience of how aggressively _^bXcXeTcP[ZPccWTT]S^UcWTSPhb_[PhFT
the Aussies bat. In England you can PaTWTaTPbPRaXRZTcd]Xcc^_[PhV^^SRaXRZTc the wicket or the ball is not helping you,
you have to let go off your strength and
get away with a little width because Q^cWX]QPccX]VP]SQ^f[X]VST_Pac\T]cbFT
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weakness and the game situation, he
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with the Australians, he said.
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3<1B;581CC8?G>
E>25<95F12<53?EB175
034;0834) Australian batsman Steve Smith

feels skipper Michael Clarke has shown

unbelievable courage in the wake of the
tragic death of Phillip Hughes and played
beautifully on Thursday battling severe back
pain to score a century.
After retiring at the score of 60 on
Tuesday, Clarke returned to the crease this
morning and scored his 28th Test hundred,
despite being in pain in his lower back.
Smith added 163 runs in 30 overs with
Clarke, who was finally out for 128
runs towards the end of the rainhit second day at Adelaide
Oval. He was keen to get out
there and get some hits and it
worked out well for him.
There were a few shots that
hurt him but he played
beautifully under the circumstances, Smith told
reporters here.
I think he has been
amazing over the last few
days. Its been tough for all of us.
By spending that whole time by
Hughesys family side, just the
strength and courage Clarke has showed to
us, that is unbelievable. He must be mentally
drained, he added.
Clarke was in the thick of things when his
close friend and teammate Hughes was fatally hit on the area around the head and neck
by a bouncer in a domestic game. He supported the Hughes family throughout the crisis.
Talking about his innings, Smith, who
notched up his fifth Test hundred hitting 162
not out, attributed his new-found patience as
the reason behind his batting form.
At the start of my career, I probably was-

nt quite as patient as I am now, Smith said.

I probably tried to play too many shots
early on in the innings and that got me in trouble. Thats the way I want to go about my business, get my patience right then I will be able
to get big runs. Today is a good example of that.
Hopefully I will continue to do so.
If I may say so, that is not my best innings.
I think my hundred at Centurion against South
Africa in those conditions was probably my best
one so far in my book. But every century is special and I hope I will get some more
this summer, he added.
When asked about the tribute he paid to Phillip Hughes,
walking over to the painted
408 number on the turf
after getting his hundred,
Smith said, I had a bit of
break when I was on 98
(because of rain). I thought
if I got two more runs, I
have to go there, and stick
my bat and thanks Hughes
for being with me out there.
Nearly four hours were lost
due to rain and as a result play will
start half an hour earlier on Thursday.
Their stand put India under the pressure as
they scored at 5.36 runs per over through the
truncated day. I think weve a good score on
the board. Its one of those wickets where we
need patience to get the wickets and all our
bowlers know what to do. I expect some good
fireworks from our bowlers.
Im not too sure about the declaration.
Whether we come out to bat a little bit longer
or straightway come out with the ball, we will
see how it goes, Smith signed off.
?C8

D]\dZcbSXb\XbbP[R^bcb3T[WXQ^]db_^X]c
=4F 34;78) Opener Unmukt Chand

failed to stick around for 16 runs as

Delhi missed out on well-deserved
bonus point despite a convincing ninewicket win over Saurashtra in the
opening group league encounter of the
Ranji Trophy cricket tournament here
on Wednesday.
The win got Delhi six points, which
easily could have been seven points had
Delhi attained the target of 16 runs
without losing a wicket.
But Unmukt, who is going through
a terrible patch at the moment, played
wrong line to an Abhishek Bhatt delivery which saw his off stump go for a
walk.
Skipper Gautam Gambhir could
only watch in disgust as Delhi blew the
easiest chance to get a bonus point having dismissed Saurashtra for 240 in the

second innings.
Young Navdeep Saini (3/27) had the
best figures but Sumit Narwal was the
bowler who made maximum impact
with his deliveries that were pitched on
perfect length with just adequate movement.
Starting the day at 163 for six,
Saurashtra added another 77 runs
before losing the remaining six wickets in only 31.3 overs. With Narwal
breaching through the defences of
Sheldon Jackson (51, 6x4) and Divyaraj
Chauhan (21), it was a matter of time
before young Navdeep took the stuffing out of the tail to polish off the tail.
Narwal was certainly best player of
the match with a haul of six wickets and
a half century.
Delhis Varun Sood played an off
drive to finish it off in style but Delhi will

certainly rue the missed opportunities.

Brief Scores
Delhi: 442 & 16/1 beat Saurashtra: 217
& (f/o) 240 in 90.3 overs (Sheldon
Jackson 51, Navdeep Saini 3/27, Sumit
Narwal 3/41) by 9 wickets.

34;78C>?;0H0;;A4<08=8=6
<0C274B0C:>C;0)270D70=

Delhi captain Gautam Gambhirs fascination to play at the Roshanara Club

ground is well documented but DDCAs
senior vice-president Chetan Chauhan
has on Wednesday official confirmed
that three of the remaining home
matches will be happening at the
Ferozeshah Kotla ground.
Let me confirm this. Delhi will
play all their remaining Ranji Trophy
matches at the Feroz Shah Kotla
ground. There will be no change in this

regard, Chauhan told the mediapersons

at a press conference here on
Wednesday.
Chauhan said that the concerns of
BCCIs ACSU unit about safety of
players cant be addressed if first-class
matches are held at Roshanara.
Roshanara is a social club where
its members are its priority. It is not a
cricket club and you cant restrict the
entry of its members. DDCA is a
cricket club and Feroz Shah Kotla is the
ground for cricketing activity, said
Chauhan.
Since the security of players might
not be upgraded at the Roshanara, the
ground where BCCI was originally
found under the stewardship of its first
president Anthony de Mello might
not ever host a first-class match again.
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heir morale lifted by a stunning

win over The Netherlands, India
would now eye a semifinal berth
when they take on an ever-improving
Belgium in the quarterfinal of the Hero
Champions Trophy hockey tournament,
here on Thursday.
India did not have the best of starts
in the elite eight-nation tournament as
they slumped to 0-1 and 2-4 defeats
against Olympic champions Germany
and World Cup bronze-medallist
Argentina respectively in their first two
Pool B matches. After losing to a late goal
against the Germans in their tournament
opener, India squandered the lead twice
to slump to a 2-4 defeat against
Argentina.
Their morale definitely took a beating after two defeats and just when they
were being counted out, the Sardar
Singh-led side produced an inspiring
performance to shock the Netherlands
3-2 in their final league match and finish third in Pool B ahead of the mighty
Germans. After the splendid show
against the Netherlands yesterday, India
will definitely fancy their chances against
the fourth-ranked Belgium.
But it would be easier said than done
as Belgium and England looked like the
teams to beat in the tournament and finished their pool engagements on an
unbeaten note. While England topped
Pool A with seven points from two wins
and a draw, the Red Lions finished second with five points by virtue of one win
and two draws.
But knock-out rounds are a completely different ball game as one bad day
in office can spoil the entire hard-work
of a team and Belgium would be completely aware of the fact. Against all
expectations, Sardar Singh and Co came
up with a superlative display to register
their first win over the Netherlands in 18
years in front of a packed Kalinga
Stadium. The win not only ended India's
two-match losing streak, but also helped
the hosts break their 18-year jinx against
the mighty Dutch. India last defeated the
Netherlands way back in 1996 in an
Olympic qualifying tournament in
Barcelona. It is also Indias first win over
the Netherlands in the Champions
Trophy after 1986 in Karachi.
The quarterfinal match would also

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provide India an opportunity to avenge

their latest defeats against Belgiumthe
2-3 loss in this year's World Cup at The
Hague and the 1-2 defeat at the Hockey
World League at New Delhi in January.
Unlike their first two matches, the
Indians looked far more coordinated and
well-orgainsed Tuesday. The hosts played
what they are known for fast-paced,
aggressive and attacking hockey and
come tomorrow they would like to
carry on in similar fashion.
We played aggressive and attacking
hockey against the Netherlands and we
want to continue our style of play in the
remaining games of the tournament,
Indias High Performance Director
Roelant Oltmans had said. Just like the
previous two matches, the Indians cre-

ated chances against the Netherlands yesterday but what was heartening was that
they utilised the opportunities that came
their way.
The positive is that we scored
thrice against a side which conceded just
one goal against Germany in the pool
stages, Oltmans said. However, as
Oltmans said there are areas to address
ahead of the crucial knock-out match.
We need to rectify some mistakes. We
need to stop conceding goals after scoring one, Oltmans said.
Having said that Oltmans believe
India has the potential to beat Belgium
and progress to the last four round. I
dont have the belief that we can Belgium
I shouldnt have been here, he quipped.
But it would be easier said than done
as Belgium and England are the two most
in-form teams in the tournament.
Another factor which might affect or
work in Indias favour is the crowd support. All in all, it is expected to be a
cracker of a contest and if India can held
on to their nerves, the home team can
come out trumps on Friday when they
play their quarter-final match.

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ith the eligibility of N

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finally received her Asian

Games bronze medal, which she
had refused to accept at the victory ceremony in Incheon
under controversial circumstances with the Indian Olympic
Association Secretary General
Rajeev Mehta presenting it to
her here on Wednesday.
L Sarita Devi, bronze
medal winner in boxing 60kg
weight category in 17th Asian
Games 2014 held in Incheon,
Korea received her medal in
New Delhi, the IOA said in a
statement.
Sarita was provisionally
suspended by the International
Boxing Federation (AIBA) after
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=4F 34;78) Boxer Sarita Devi

D:?8=6D

she refused to accept her medal

following a controversial semifinal loss in the Asian Games.
The AIBA is yet to take a
final call on the quantum of
Sarita's punishment but Dr
Wu has already made it clear
that her career is as good as
over despite tendering an
unconditional apology for her
actions.
Mehta said that the IOA
has also written a letter to the
AIBA to take a lenient view on
Sarita. I had a lengthy discussion with Sarita today and I
told her the IOA is behind her.
We have also written a letter
to the AIBA to take a lenient
view on her, he said.

uncertain, the Supreme Court on

Wednesday asked BCCI to hold
over election of its office bearers till
January 31, 2015. By this time, the
Court is expected to pronounce the
terms of reference for the proposed
high-level Committee that will
enquire Srinivasans conflict of
interest and disciplinary action
against persons and teams named
in the IPL betting scam by the
Justice Mudgal panel.
The suggestion to postpone
the date of elections of its Annual
General Body Meeting (AGM),
earlier fixed for December 17,
came from BCCI after it saw that
the hearing in the IPL scam would
extend into the next week.
On Wednesday, Srinivasan
concluded his arguments suggesting that he was open to a high powered committee examining the disciplinary action to be initiated
against persons named by Justice
Mudgal panel but was of the view
that conflict of interest must be
generally enquired into and not
specifically in relation to him.
He even gave an undertaking to
the Court that in the event of his
election as BCCI president, he will
keep away from any decision on IPL
scam or Working Committee or
Governing Council meetings ahead

5X[T??W^c^^^U
=BBaX]XePb]

of the next IPL season in April-May.

The bench of Justices TS
Thakur and FM Ibrahim Kalifulla
also heard counsels for Meiyappan,
India Cements Limited (which
owns Chennai Super Kings),
Rajasthan Royals and its partowner Raj Kundra.
While the hearing would resume
on Monday, the bench asked lawyers
appearing for India Cements and

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Rajasthan Royals to suggest what

penal consequences will visit the
teams whose officials or owners were
found involved in betting activities.
Counsel for India Cements
senior advocate Mahesh Jethmalani
sought to escape liability by
terming Meiyappans actions as his
personal fault so long as he did not
place the bets from the venue of the
game. He argued that as owner the
company had thousands of officials
under him and it was practically
impossible to keep an eye on what
everybody did from the confines of
their homes and offices.
The bench reasoned that such
an argument was not conducive to
ensure fairness in the game which
requires team officials to be of high
integrity.
Kundra, on his part, questioned
the Mudgal panel and its findings
which did not adopt the BCCI rules
nor gave the accused a fair hearing
before indicting them.
The highlight of the day was
Meiyappan, whose lawyer requested the Court to allow him his right
to silence as he had to defend himself in a court of law on similar
charges. I have a right to silence,
said senior counsel Siddharth Luthra
appearing for Meiyappan.
The bench found him noncommittal on being a CSK team
official, despite India Cements and
his own father-in-law conceding
this fact in their arguments earlier
in the day.

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0?Q 64=4E0

iverpools decline and fall from the

European elite was confirmed on
L
Tuesday, as Basel held the hosts to a 1-1
draw at Anfield to reach the last 16 of the
Champions League.
The five-time European champion
trailed Fabian Frei's 25th-minute strike,
and had substitute Lazar Markovic sent
off in the 60th, before Captain Steven
Gerrards 81st-minute free kick sparked
a frantic finish.
Liverpool twice failed to beat Basel
and was outclassed by Group B winner
Real Madrid on returning from a fiveyear absence in a competition it once
dominated, and twice reached the final
when its inspirational captain was at his
peak.
You always qualify over the six
games and unfortunately we haven't
been good enough, Gerrard said.
Madrid completed the only perfect
group-stage record of six wins after
Cristiano Ronaldo's penalty started a 40 rout of Ludogorets Razgrad. It also set

a Spanish record of 19 straight wins in all

competitions. I know Ive got an extraordinary team, I don't tire from saying
this, Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti said.
Juventus advanced with typical Italian
caution, drawing 0-0 at home to Atletico
Madrid which topped Group A.
Olympiakos beat Malmo 4-2, and is
rewarded for a third-place finish by
joining the last 32 of the Europa League.
Monaco beat Zenit St. Petersburg 20 to win Group C, rising above Bayer
Leverkusen which drew 0-0 at last-place
Benfica. Borussia Dortmund won Group
D by drawing 1-1 at home to Anderlecht.
Runner-up Arsenal won 4-1 against the
Istanbul club Galatasaray.
Arsenal is a near-permanent fixture
in the last 16 but will once again be
unseeded in the draw next Monday
where Madrid and Bayern Munich are
potential opponents.
Liverpool is heading to the Europa
League draw, also Monday, after completing its group program with just a single
win - and that due to a stoppage-time
penalty against Ludogorets.

Another stoppage-time winner in the 20th minute. His 72nd career

Tuesday would have sent Anfield into Champions League goal trails Lionel
raptures but defender Martin Skrtel, Messi by two. Gareth Bale headed a secplaying as an emergency forward, poked ond in the 38th, and a mismatch ended
a shot just wide of Basels right-hand post with late goals from Alvaro Arbeloa and
Alvaro Medran.
of the goal.
Juventus could be
Switzerland's chamItaly's only representapion extended its impresA4BD;CB
tive in the last 16 while
sive record against English
9deT]cdb 0c[TcXR^<PSaXS
Monaco gave resurgent
clubs, three years after it
>[h\_XPZ^b#! <P[\^55
France a second, joining
beat Manchester United in
;XeTa_^^[  1PbT[
Paris Saint-Germain
a decisive group match
ATP[<PSaXS# ;dS^V^aTcb
which plays Barcelona on
and 12 years after getting
1T]XUXRP 1PhTa;deTaZdbT]
Wednesday. In August,
a last-day draw it needed
<^]PR^! Bc?TcTabQdaV
to oust Liverpool.
1^adbbXP3^ac\d]S  0]STa[TRWc Monaco was considered
the weakest team of the
Basel deservedly led
6P[PcPbPaPh # 0abT]P[
group by everybody, even
through Frei's neat, leftin France, Monaco coach
foot shot from the edge of the
Leonardo Jardim said.
penalty area and was helped in the
Needing a draw to
second half when Markovics
advance, a Monaco team
raised right-arm was judged have
which let superstar Colombia
struck chasing defender Behrang
forwards Radamel Falcao and
Safari in the face. Defending
James Rodriguez leave in the
champion Madrid took advantage
of Ludogorets forward Marcelinho being offseason doubled its goal tally in the
sent off for handball which allowed competition.
Defenders got both goals in Monte
Ronaldo to score from the penalty spot

Carlo, with center-back Aymen

Abdennour scoring in the 63rd and fullback Fabinho in the 89th as Zenit pressed
for goals. The Russian club now switches to the Europa League.
Olympiakos was twice pegged back
by visiting Malmo before Kostas
Mitroglou and Ibrahim Afellay scored in
the closing minutes to secure a 4-2 win.
Arsenal threatened to humiliate
Galatasaray after an opening goal from
Lukas Podolski and two more from
Aaron Ramsey earned a 3-0 lead within
29 minutes in the game.
Netherlands veteran Wesley Sneijder
scored late for the Istanbul club, before
Podolski got his second in stoppage
time for the gunner. Borussia Dortmund
needed a point to clinch the group and
earned it through Ciro Immobile's 58thminute goal. Aleksandar Mitrovic leveled
in the 84th for Anderlecht which goes to
the Europa League.
The group stage of the UEFA
Champions League comes to an end on
Wednesday, with the last two places in the
knockout stage up for grabs.