First India-Ahmedabad Edition-07 August 2020

OUR EDITIONS: JAIPUR & AHMEDABAD

CORONA

27°C - 35°C

ALERT AHMEDABAD l FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020 l Pages 12 l 3.00

COVID-19 UPDATE

WORLD

7,13,895 1,91,15,474 CONFIRMED CASES

DEATHS

MAHARASHTRA 16,792 DEATHS 4,79,779 CASES

TAMIL NADU 4,571 DEATHS 2,79,144 CASES

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RNI NO. GUJENG/2019/16208 l Vol 1 l Issue No. 253

INDIA

41,631 20,24,502 DEATHS

CONFIRMED CASES

DELHI 4,059 DEATHS 1,41,531 CASES

GUJARAT

2,584 DEATHS

KARNATAKA 2,897 DEATHS 1,58,254 CASES

67,811

CONFIRMED CASES

RAJASTHAN 757 DEATHS 48,996 CASES

BSP MLAs MERGER: GEHLOT GOVT GETS A BREATHER FROM RAJ HIGH COURT

No final judicial order on BSP MLAs likely before Aug 14!

CJ led division bench disposes petitions by BSP and BJP Aditi Nagar & Nizam Kantaliya Jaipur: Inspite of Rajasthan High Court’s exceptional decisive mood to bring the entire issue of 6 BSP legislators to a logical conclusion, according to legal experts, there is no possibility of a final

TRAGEDY STRIKES

judicial order on the issue of the merger of BSP MLAs before August 14, the day when a special Assembly session begins.

It clearly indicates that in absence of a final judicial judgement to order a stay on the voting rights of these MLAs in the Assembly,

all 6 MLAs will be free to exercise their vote on the floor of the House in favor of Gehlot government, if it comes to a trust vote.

In this way, division bench’s Thursday order is being considered as some sort of a relief to the Ashok Gehlot government.

The bench was headed by Chief Justice Indrajeet Mahanty and also having Justice

Prakash Gupta as another colleague judge.

The only exception to this situation can be when all judicial proceedings in this case in HC and even in Supreme Court are disposed off before August 14 and BSP MLAs are debarred from participating in the trust vote exercise and Gehlot government is virtually reduced to a minority, but this looks a

CM Ashok Gehlot

distance possibility because going by the principal of natural justice, no judgement is likely to be passed without hearing viewpoint or side of 6 BSP MLAs and this mandatory service of notice will be a very difficult exercise. According to sources, all 6 BSP MLAs, who are camping at a Jaisalmer hotel at the moment, are being shifted to some

other ‘unknown destination’, where the concerned district and sessions judge (as order by CJ bench) will not be able to trace and serve them the notice even through a ‘reluctant’ local police. Notably, the division bench had specifically asked Jaisalmer and Barmer district judges to ensure the timely delivery of notices, taking the help of local SP. Turn on P6

8 KILLED IN AHMEDABAD RBI keeps repo rate HOSP ICU BLAZE; 2 HELD unchanged at 4 pc

CM Vijay Rupani orders IAS officers to probe incident, fire likely caused by short-circuit Gargi Raval Ahmedabad: Eight COVID-19 patients died and several others were injured after a massive fire broke out in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of privately owned Shrey Hospital in Navrangpura area of the city around 3.30 am on Thursday. More than 40 survivors have been shifted to Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (SVP) Hospital.

LB Zala, Assistant

Commissioner of Police (ACP) (B-Division) said that the hospital’s trustee Bharat Mahant and a ward boy had been detained by Navrangpura police.

Rajendra Asari, JCP, Sector 1, Ahmedabad, said, “Eight people have died in the fire incident. Other patients have been shifted to a safer place. We are taking the help of fire and forensic experts in the investigation. A thorough investigation will

be conducted.”

Ahmedabad Fire and Emergency Services personnel rescued at least 40 patients and one paramedic from the fire, which occurred on the fourth floor of the designated COVID-19 hospital.

Fire Officer Rajesh Bhatt said, “When our team reached the hospital, the ICU had already been gutted. The eight patients who died in the fire included five male Turn on P6

COMPENSATION ANNOUNCED PMO INDIA @PMOINDIA Ex-gratia of Rs. 2 lakh each from PMNRF would be given to the next of kin of those who have lost their lives due to the hospital fire in Ahmedabad. Rs. 50,000 each would be given to those injured due to the hospital fire. Saddened by the tragic hospital fire in Ahmedabad. Condolences to the bereaved families. May the injured recover soon.

Spoke to CM @vijayrupanibjp Ji and Mayor @ibijalpatel Ji regarding the situation. Administration is providing all possible assistance to the affected.

Top: Inside visuals of Shrey Hospital after a major fire broke out in it, in Ahmedabad on Thursday; Above: Relatives mourn the death of their near ones.

—PHOTOS BY HANIF SINDHI

AMIT SHAH @AMITSHAH Deeply anguished by the loss of lives due to a tragic fire accident at a hospital in Ahmedabad.

My condolences and thoughts are with the affected families in this hour of grief. Praying for the speedy recovery of those injured.

AHMED PATEL @AHMEDPATEL Distressed to learn about the tragic incident at Shrey Hospital,Ahmedabad My thoughts & prayers are with the victims & their families in this hour of grief The local administration must provide necessary assistance and thoroughly investigate the cause of this fire

Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced an ex-gratia amount of Rs2 lakh to the families of all those who lost their lives in the fire from the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund. Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani has announced an ex gratia amount of Rs 4 lakhs each to the families of the eight victims who died in the fire at Shrey Hospital in Ahmedabad, said the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) on Thursday.

The CMO added that Rs 50,000 would be given to those injured in the incident.

GDP growth seen negative in Financial Year 2021 Mumbai: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Thursday kept the key repo rate unchanged at 4 per cent in view of rising inflation and faint signs of economic growth amid the gradual lifting of coronavirus (COVID-19) countrywide lockdown.

The central bank’s monetary policy committee (MPC) began its three-day meeting on August 4 and maintained the stance as accommodative. It also kept the reverse repo rate unchanged at 3.35 per cent. Repo is the rate at which RBI lends funds

to commercial banks when needed. It is a tool that the central bank uses to control inflation.

While there are some signs of a pick up in ac-

tivity due to the staggered easing of a lockdown, there is a large degree of uncertainty amid a surge in virus cases.

Turn on P6

GC Murmu is new CAG while Manoj Sinha is J&K’s new LG New Delhi: Girish Chandra Murmu, the former Lt Governor of Jammu and Kashmir, has been appointed the new Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG).

Murmu will be replacing Rajiv Mehrishi, a 1978 batch IAS officer of the Rajasthan cadre, as the CAG. Mehrishi will be turning 65

GC Murmu

on August 8.

The 60-year-old former IAS officer of the Gujarat cadre, Mur-

mu, had on October 29 last year taken over as the first LG of the Union territory after J&K was made into two UTs. Murmu has also served as principal secretary to Narendra Modi during his tenure as Gujarat chief minister.

Earlier, Manoj Sinha replaced Murmu as the L-G of J&K. P5

INDIA-CHINA BORDER ROW

IPL 2020 TITLE SPONSORSHIP: BCCI & VIVO PART WAYS! Mumbai: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and Vivo Mobile India Pvt Ltd have decided to suspend their partnership for Indian Premier League (IPL) in 2020, an IPL media advisory confirmed.

The BCCI on Thursday suspended the IPL title sponsorship deal with Chinese mobile phone company Vivo for the event’’s upcoming edition amid soaring Sino-India diplo-

matic tensions.

The BCCI sent out a one-line statement without giving any details to say that Vivo will not be associated with the IPL this year.

“The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and vivo Mobile India Pvt Ltd have decided to suspend their partnership for Indian Premier League in 2020,” the press release stated.

Vivo won the IPL title

sponsorship rights for five years from 2018 to 2022 for a reported sum of Rs 2190 crore, approximately Rs 440 crore per annum.

The BCCI is likely to float a tender for the new title sponsors as mandated by its constitution.

The IPL scheduled on September 19-November 10 in UAE, forced out of India due to the rising COVID-19 cases.

Vivo had bagged the

title sponsorship for two years initially in 2015, and retained the rights signing a fiveyear contract (2017-22), paying about USD 341 million.

It is as yet unclear what the status of the contract is for the next edition of the IPL and beyond.

The decision is not likely to significantly affect the franchises financially. It is understood each franchise

gets approximately Rs 20 crore (USD 2.67 million approx) per year from the Vivo contract.

As long as the BCCI can rope in a replacement for Vivo, this development should not have any impact on them, said sources.

The 53-day tournament will witness 10-afternoon matches starting at 15:30 IST while the evening matches will start at 19:30 IST. —ANI

NEWS AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

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Even 14 months after the Takshashila Arcade fire, the state is yet to prioritize fire safety Haresh Jhala Ahmedabad: Following the death of eight COVID-19 patients at Ahmedabad’s Shrey Hospital on Thursday, local authorities across the state have begun to crack down on hospitals that do not meet fire safety norms.

By 10 am on Thursday, fire department officers had begun to conduct fire-safety checks at hospitals, especially ones designated as COVID-19 facilities.

They found that an eyewatering number of medical facilities failed these checks.

In Ahmedabad alone, 1931 hospitals—including designated COVID-19 facilities like Shrey Hospital—did not have a no-objection certificate (NOC) from the fire department. Unconfirmed reports say that even the Civil Hospital in Rajkot does not have a fire NOC. The Bhavnagar Corporation issued notice to seven COVID-19 designated private hospitals for not having adequate fire safety measures in place.

However, if past experience is anything to go by, this flurry of activity and crackdowns will soon cease, just as those that followed Surat’s Takshashila Arcade fire did.

Immediately after the Surat fire, which took place on May 24, 2019, and left 22 students dead, the state government ordered the closure of all coaching classes until fire safety inspections were conducted. The government also ordered a fire safety inspection of schools, colleges, coaching centres, hospitals, shopping malls and other commercial buildings.

Yet, it wasn’t long until these ripples died down and things went

back to normal. Fire safety was soon back at its customary low position on the government’s priority list.

This may be dismissed as merely an opinion.

However, the fact is, the state government only enacted Fire Prevention and Life Safety measures Act 2013 after the High Court of Gujarat ordered it to do so at the end of a 22-year-long judicial battle.

After no action on this front for six years, the state government set up the Fire Services Authority in May 2019.

However, this body had no power, nor was it given a workforce or infrastructure for another nine months. In February 2020, the state government approved 672 personnel, 100 vehicles and announced that five regional offices— one each in Surat, Vadodara, Gandhinagar, Rajkot and Gandhidham—had been approved. Till today, this body is run by its In-charge Director.

Across the board, fire departments in nagarpalika and municipal corporation areas are short of either staff or equipment.

An Ahmedabad Fire and Emergency Services officer told First India that the civic body-run department is running on just 40% of its approved staff strength. “In the past decade, 16 new fire stations have been set up in the city, but we’re short of staff. There isn’t enough recruitment to meet the approved strength,” this person said.

While Ahmedabad’s fire chief Mehernosh Dastoor could not be reached for comment for this article, he has, in the past gone on record to state that fire-

Ahmedabad Fire and Emergency Services personnel put out a blaze in Ahmedabad. The city’s fire department is reportedly short on staff, equipment, and even uniforms.

—FILE PHOT

fighters do not even have adequate uniforms.

Surat Fire department has an approved strength of 1,001, including one post of Chief Fire Officer and Additional Chief Fire Officer. However, the entire department is run by In-charge Chief Fire Officer BK Pareek and a Deputy Chief Fire Officer. Pareek could not be reached for comment for this article, either.

The Vadodara fire department is also headed by an In-charge CFO, PG Brahmbhatt, who told First India that the department runs on 45% of its allotted manpower, fire stations and equip-

ment.

Thus, it becomes evident that the government—both at the state and local level—does not prioritize fire safety, raising questions on how long the authorities’ current interest in safety protocols at hospitals can be sustained.

In addition, this attitude also moves the onus of maintaining fire safety to the general public. If people are concerned about their safety, they need to build pressure on local authorities and the state government to prioritize fire departments, ensuring them adequate staff as well as funding, which reached them in a timely manner.

MAJOR FIRE TRAGEDIES NEW DELHI UPHAAR CINEMA (JUNE 13, 1997)

 59 audience members

each and held that their jail terms will be reduced to the term already undergone by them if they pay the fine, considering their old age

died during a screening of the film ‘Border’

 In 2015, Delhi trial

court convicted 12 accused including owners Sushil and Gopal Ansal, and sentenced them to two years in prison

 Neelam Krishnamoor-

thy, who lost two teenage children in the incident, had described the SC judgement as a “travesty of justice”.

 On 19 August 2015,

the Supreme Court fined the Ansal brothers a total of 60 crore

SURAT TAKSHASHILA ARCADE (MAY 24, 2019)

 At least 22 stu-

dents were killed and several others injured in a fire at a coaching centre  Students were

trapped because the only way to the top floor was a wooden staircase which was destroyed by the

BHUBANESWAR: SUM HOSPITAL (OCTOBER 17, 2016)  22 patients killed

fire.

KOLKATA AMRI HOSPITAL (DECEMBER 10, 2011)

 85 patients and four

 Police arrested

11 including four engineers from the Surat civic body, an officer from Dakshin Gujarat Vij Company Ltd, three builders of the complex, the owner of the coaching class.

staffers killed

 Fire broke out at 3 am  Fire brigade was in-

formed at 4.10 am.

 Spread of the fire was

aided by the illegal storage of flammable material in the basement of the hospital.

 Kolkata police had

arrested six board members

 Till 2018, seven years

later trial court had not passed its judgement.

 The hospital began

admitting patients again in 2014.

 “Why is there no time

bound period for trial court?” asked Paromita Guha Thakurta, who lost her 64-year-old mother Mridula Devi in the tragedy.

MUMBAI: ESIC KAMGAR HOSPITAL (DECEMBER 18, 2018)  Eight patients died and

176 were injured in major fire accident

 Fire broke out around 7.30 pm and

raged until 10.15 pm

 Fire broke out when

 Fire first spotted in dialysis ward,

sparks from nearby welding work come in contact with flammable material lying around

spread to ICU

 Security personnel allegedly kept

patients from running away

 Two welders arrested for

 Superintendent, two electrical engi-

negligence

neers and fire safety officer arrested

EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT

‘Blast escalated fire which gripped the ICU ward’ Ward boy Chirag Patel recounts the horrific details of a day he’ll never forget



First India Bureau Ahmedabad: The eyewitness to the fire incident at Shrey Hospital in the city that took the lives of eight COVID-19 patients, Chirag Patel has been detained by the police for questioning. A ward boy at the hospital, Chirag was

one of the few eyewitnesses of the accident who saw firsthand how the fire engulfed the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) on the fourth floor.

Narrating the whole incident, Patel said, “It must have been somewhere between 2.58 am and 3.12 am, I had just

It must have been somewhere between 2.58 am and 3.12 am, I had just gone out of the ward to get a drink of water, when another staffer rushed out calling for help. There had been a spark near bed number 9 and a female patient’s hair had caught fire.

—Chirag Patel,

ward boy at Shrey Hospital

gone out of the ward to get a drink of water, when another staffer rushed out calling for

help. There had been a spark near bed number 9 and a female patient’s hair had caught fire.”

“One of the doctors and I rushed into the ward and tried to douse the fire, when another

ward boy’s PPE kit caught fire. So, we started pouring water on him but then the

doctor suffered burn injuries. Before anyone could understand anything, there was a blast and it engulfed the entire ward. There was zero visibility and that was the biggest hurdle we faced while trying to rescue people,” he added.

When asked about the fire extinguishers, Chirag claimed that they had used three extinguishers, so there was no question of not having fire

safety measures in place. According to him, after the blast occurred, the fire spread so quickly that it became difficult to fight it. Since there was no visibility in the ward, none of the patients in the ICU could be rescued. Although, the patients inside the ward opposite to the ICU and the ones on the third and second floors were all safely moved to the ground floor by staffers.

GUJARAT AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

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Just 4.5% of A’bad hospitals fire safe...

As many as 1,931 of the city’s 2,022 hospitals do not have fire safety NOCs, which are issued to institutions that have working safety equipment —PHOTO BY HANIF SINDHI

An outpouring of grief for ... situation just loved ones lost too soon as abysmal in Rajkot and Surat First India Bureau

Hearses from the local civic body line up outside Shrey Hospital on Thursday.

First India Bureau

TWEETS

Ahmedabad: Thursday’s fire at Shrey Hospital, which claimed the lives of eight COVID-19 patients, has revealed that as many as 1,931 of the city’s 2,022 hospitals do not have fire safety certification—meaning just 4.5% of them do.

“The hospital where the incident took place didn’t have a fire safety certificate. Even, the equipment was out of date. When the fire team reached the spot, the ICU was already gutted. The hospital didn’t review their fire safety certificate, which is a no-objection certificate (NOC),” said a senior officer of the Ahmedabad Fire and Emergency Services.

As per the latest figures, there are 1,931 hospitals that don’t have fire safety NOCs, the certifi-

RECENT CASES

cation given to institutions which have equipment required for fire safety in working condition, this officer added.

Following the incident, leader of the opposition in the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation, Dinesh Sharma said, “The officers are taking bribes from the hospi-

The death of 8 COVID-19 patients who were on ventilator support in the ICU ward of Shrey Hospital designated as a COVID-19 hospital by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation is very saddening. My heart goes out to the families of the deceased. Action should be taken against concerned municipal officials and the government should offer Rs50 lakh to affected families.

—ARJUN MODHWADIA, Former GPCC president

tals to declare them COVID-19 designated facilities. The system only wakes up when such type of tragedy occurs. Things will be normal again for them in a few days and this episode will be erased from their minds.”

Dariyapur MLA Gyasuddin Shaikh lay the blame squarely with the top brass. He said: “This incident is very serious and the result of criminal negligence by the hospitals and the municipal corporation. The priority is to investigate the matter. Didn’t the officers check things like BU permission, staff, medical equipment, and fire safety when they permitted the hospital to begin operations? I strongly believe that Rajiv Gupta, Mukesh Kumar, and mayor Bijal Patel are all responsible for this incident.”

Rajkot/ Surat: In Rajkot, officials say just seven of the 19 designated COVID-19 hospitals have fire NOCs. All seven of these are privately run, meaning the three government-run facilities—the PDU Super-Speciality COVID-19 Hospital, Samras Girls Hostel and Rainbasera COVID-care centres—are not certified by the fire department. Worse, the government hospital and Samras Girls Hostel don’t even have basic equipment like fire extinguishers.

As Rajkot Deputy Municipal Commissioner (health) B. G. Prajapati told First India, “The city has 19 designated COVID-19 hospitals, of which seven private hospitals have NOCs.” In Surat, in the wake of the Takshashila fire last

Expressing his condolences to the people who died in the fire incident at Shrey Hospital in Ahmedabad, Chief Minister Vijay Rupani extends an ex-gratia of Rs4 lakh to each of the families of the deceased from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund. All those injured in the incident will receive an amount of Rs50,000 each.

—CHIEF MINISTER’S OFFICE (CMO) I express my deepest sympathies to those who lost their lives in the tragic fire tragedy at Shrey Hospital. My condolences go out to the bereaved families in this hour of grief. I pray that those wounded recover soon.

—BIJAL PATEL, Ahmedabad Mayor The fire at the Ahmedabad hospital is extremely tragic. I hope that God gives strength to the families of those who died in the fire. I also pray that those who have been injured in the incident heal as soon as possible.

—CR PATIL, BJP State Unit President

year, the civic body had had issued notices to around 40 hospitals, asking that they produce fire NOCs within seven days, failing which the establishments would be sealed. Now, following Thursday’s hospital fire in Ahmedabad, fire department officials have begun to examine safety equipment at the city’s 42 COVID-19 designated hospitals. They are also carrying out rehearsals on how to rescue patients in case of fire at a hospital.

By way of explanation, an official in the Rajkot Municipal Corporation said, “When a particular hospital or facility is designated for COVID-19, the rapid response team usually just checks the medical facilities and those pertaining to patient management.

Fire norms are not a priority and may be looked at a later stage.”

CM to announce new industrial policy State will aim to bolster manufacturing, seek out next-gen sectors



Our state accounts for 43% of all start-ups across the country.

The innovation by start-ups has given birth to the spirit of ‘Make in India’, a dream that is coming true after more than 70 years of independence.

First India Bureau

—FILE PHOTO

Chief Minister Vijay Rupani.

view of the current situation in the state, it may push hard and to attract investments from the pharmaceutical sector for bulk drug production to lower its dependence on Chinese products. A special emphasis on the textile sector will also be on the state’s agenda.

CM Rupani said, “Our state has become

a start-up hub and it accounts for 43% of all start-ups across the country. The innovation by start-ups has given birth to the spirit of ‘Make in India’, a dream that is coming true after more than 70 years of independence.”

He also outlined the strategies that the state government had adopted for start-ups, includ-

Ahmedabad: After news of the fire at Shrey Hospital in Navrangpura area of the city broke out, family members and relatives of COVID-19 patients thronged the hospital premises on Thursday morning.

Priyanshi Sheth, the granddaughter of Lilavatiben Shah, expressed her grief at not heeding to her grandmother’s plea to return home.

“We learnt about the fire on the news. My family had spent Rs6 lakh for the treatment of my grandmother. On Wednesday evening, she had spoken to my father and said that she wished to return home,” she lamented.

Chirag Shah, relative of the deceased fatherson duo Navneet Shah and Narendra Shah, cried foul over the lack of adequate fire safety measures at the hospital. “We have lost our loved ones because of the hospital’s negligence, after paying Rs11 lakh for the treatment of our relatives,” he stated.

After learning of Jyoti Sindhi’s demise in the

Grief-stricken relatives gathered outside the hospital.

THE DECEASED

fire, her family members rushed to the hospital. “Two days ago, Jyoti’s COVID-19 test had come back negative and she was going to be shifted from the ICU to the general ward. She even spoke to the family on Wednesday night. Eight hours later, we learnt she was dead. We want her back!” cried Jyoti’s sister-in-law.

The news of 8 people dying in a fire at a COVID-19 hospital is very sad.

Those injured must be administered treatment.

Such fire tragedies have been occurring repeatedly due to the mismanagement and corruption of the Vijay Rupani government and the Ahmedabad Municpal Corporation. People are dying of COVID-19 but, they are also unfortunately losing their lives due to negligence of the system.

—AMIT CHAVDA, Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee President

MOVING FORWARD

Gandhinagar: Chief Minister Vijay Rupani is set to announce a new industrial policy which had been delayed since December last year, today. According to sources, the state government is likely to focus more on next-generation sectors, renewable energy, and start-ups.

The state may seek to strengthen its manufacturing sector post the Indo-China political tug-of-war.

Two parks which include one for medical equipment in Rajkot and a Bulk Drug Park in Dahej have already been announced by the government. But, in

—PHOTOS BY HANIF SINDHI

First India Bureau

ing the Start-up Policy, Student Start-up Innovation Policy to promote new start-ups.

The chief minister expressed his commitment to encourage young minds equipped with a wealth of knowledge about science for innovation. He said that children should be encouraged to find solutions to the state’s problems

—CM Vijay Rupani

through new inventive ideas derived from their experience from their educational lives.

Rupani and Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel on Thursday handed over 360 flats allocated to corresponding beneficiaries under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna in Unjha town of Mehsana district through an e-launch.

Sudden death: Silent hypoxia, fulminant myocarditis culprits

—PHOTO BY HANIF SINDHI

First India Bureau Gandhinagar: Losing a loved one is always hard, more so if the death is sudden and unexpected, as in case of a COVID-19 patient in Vadodara recently.

However, doctors say such sudden deaths brought on by the novel coronavirus could be caused by silent hypoxia—where the body is deprived of oxygen at the tissue level—and fulminant myocarditis—a sudden and severe diffuse cardiac inflammation.

Gotri hospital’s nodal officers Dr. Shital Mistry explained that these two conditions can cause sudden and unexpected deaths, as in the case of a patient who had talked to relatives just two days before his demise.

In the past 24 hours, the state has tested

A medic at Ahmedabad’s designated Shrey Hospital, where eight nCov patients were killed after a fire broke out on Thursday.

24,569 samples. There are now 14,905 active cases in Gujarat, with 82 patients on ventilator support.

The highest number of fresh cases, 238, were again reported in Surat; 184 in the city and 54 from rural areas.

Ahmedabad had 151, Vadodara, 118, Rajkot, 90, Junagadh and Bhavnagar, 44 each, Mehsana, 34, Gandhinagar, 32, Kutch, 27, Kheda, 21, and Amreli and Patan had 20 each.

1,034 new cases and 27 fatalities bring tally to 67,811 and death toll to 2,584 Twenty-seven patients died on Thursday: nine from Surat, five each from Ahmedabad and Rajkot, three from Vadodara, two from Kutch, and one each from Jamnagar, Mehsana and Valsad.

PERSPECTIVE AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

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INDIAN UNIVERSITIES DIDN’T NEED NEP TO CHANGE THINGS, BUT FEARED UGC TOO MUCH DINESH SINGH Former Vice Chancellor, University of Delhi

T

If implemented properly, we should expect nothing but good outcomes from the recommendations in NEP 2020 that pertain to higher education.

However, a word of caution is in order. Not ensuring the spirit of the NEP vision can also cause a lot of harm. One of the most important of these dangers relates to the training and orientation of the teaching faculty

here are two very striking reasons that compel me to discuss several features and recommendations of the recently announced National Education Policy, or NEP 2020, by the Narendra Modi government. While one of them is a personal success story, the other is an academic puzzle in the form of agencies like UGC that have for long been the bane of Indian universities. Let’s start with the latter one.

As I understand, nearly all the features of the NEP 2020 in the context of higher education could have easily been introduced by any central university without a push from the government. These universities have had all the powers and regulatory bandwidth to implement the policy recommendations as suggested under the NEP ‘umbrella’.

In such a scenario, it’s worth examining why this did not happen and what it portends for India’s education system.

THE FAILURE OF UGC There are two compelling factors why Indian universities couldn’t do what a national policy is now trying to achieve. The first is the dark shadow cast by agencies such as the University Grants Commission (UGC), which deter any experimentation.

Over the years, the UGC has acquired all kinds of strange and counterproductive powers that often run against the grain of the Acts and Statutes of a university.

These actions hamper free thinking in universities, and there is micromanagement to the extreme. We need not look any further than the issue of how universities will handle examinations during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. If our universities do not have the requisite wisdom and wherewithal to deal with such straightforward situations, how will they impart any useful

knowledge to their students?

The matter has gone to the ridiculous length of being taken up by the Supreme Court of India.

Contrast this with the ways adopted by the highly regarded universities of the West, which have often been cited in the debates engendered by the NEP. All prominent universities have taken decisions within the confines of their own realm and environment. So why have Indian universities not been able to do so?

Of course, the NEP 2020 has warranted the creation of an overarching and solitary agency — the National Higher Education Regulatory Council (NHERC) — which carries the spirit with which the UGC was initially created. But it also carries much more in terms of its ambit as the new regulatory body. If it stays the way it has been envisioned, a lot of good will flow through the actions of the agency. If it falters the way the UGC has over the past decades, the NHERC can cause enormous damage.

Thus, it is incumbent on the government of the day to ensure that institutions do not degenerate over time. However, in the current context, it shall be unfair to lay the sole blame for the sorry state of affairs on the doorstep of the UGC.

TEACHING STAFF IN INDIAN UNIVERSITIES HAVE BEEN SCHOOLED IN TRADITIONAL MANNER AND DO NOT GRASP MEANING AND IMPORTANCE OF TRANS-DISCIPLINARY EDUCATION, PROJECTBASED LEARNING, AND HOW KNOWLEDGE CAN BE LINKED TO ENTREPRENEURIAL ACTIVITY

THE FAILURE OF UNIVERSITIES A great deal of responsibility also lies with India’s universities and with those who head them. I have repeatedly underscored the need to put in place processes and measures that ensure the selection of only high-quality leadership for our universities. If we do not do this, then no amount of policy making will get us anywhere.

In any case, with policies, there are other dangers as well. Sometimes, a policy can create many pitfalls such as a ‘one size fits all’ prescription. They can also bind us to a path that may need to be changed or corrected in the light of new learning.

None of the much vaunted institutions of learning — such as Harvard University, Stanford University and the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine — have gotten where they have

riding on the back of a centrally crafted policy. In fact, Harvard University began to acquire its hallowed aura only when the local government — in 1870 — relinquished control of the now famed university.

A PERSONAL ACHIEVEMENT The thing about good policies is that formulating them is like winning half the battle — the only thing left for the complete victory is to implement them. This brings me to the first — personal — reason why I am also delighted at, and therefore welcome, the Modi government’s NEP 2020.

As it so happens, most of the features that pertain to higher education in the NEP are a near verbatim reproduction of the essential features of the four-year undergraduate programme (FYUP) envisioned and implemented at the University of Delhi when I was its Vice Chancellor. I am

thus quite enthused by the recommendations of the NEP. I say this with much conviction because if implemented in the right manner, they should help bring about significant all-round improvement. The results and feedback from the time we ran the FYUP have strengthened our belief on its value and strength. Unfortunately, after an excellent run for a year, the FYUP was rolled back under a UGC directive that carried no justification.

However, and propitiously, what has gone largely unnoticed is the fact that we ran in parallel, and without interruption, an even more strengthened version of the FYUP at the Cluster Innovation Centre (CIC). That programme runs to this day. The CIC was created during my time as the Vice Chancellor under very airtight conditions, and it remained impervious to the assaults of the UGC.

CIC, A SUCCESS STORY The first bunch of graduating students have now spread their wings far and wide.

They are not just employed at top corporate institutions such as Google but have also succeeded as entrepreneurs.

There is much evidence from recent times. A United States and Delhi-based startup, Delightree, founded by two of our CIC graduates who sowed

Even before Hiroshima, people knew atomic bomb

M

ilton Rothmar, an American Army corporal stationed in Italy, got the news about the Hiroshima bombing from the Armed Forces newspaper Stars and Stripes. He wrote: “The headline said ‘Atomic Bomb.’ To a person who has been raised on stories such as The Final War, this was both a terror and a hope. Man could use this to destroy everything.”

But Rothmar couldn’t suppress his excitement at the prospect that atomic energies might be put to less destructive purposes: “Goddam but it is thrilling to hear the words ‘atomic energy’ used on the radio like they were talking about the latest model car.

I feel like shouting to everybody ‘I told you so!’”

His reaction, written down the very day he

heard the news, might seem oddly prescient: how did he so quickly understand all the implications and possibilities of what was supposed to be a topsecret weapon?

The answer is that he had been thinking about them for years – and so had many other Americans. The sudden appearance of a real atomic bomb was shocking, but its nature – and the implications of its use – had been talked about for decades. People grappling with the news of Hiroshima did so less by learning new information than by remembering things they had long known.

FASCINATED BY RADIOACTIVITY American newspapers were blaring headlines about Hiroshima within hours of the attack. They

were based on an announcement from President Truman that began by describing the astonishing magnitude of the explosion – 2,000 times bigger than anything that had gone before – before explaining that this was possible because the bomb in question “is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic

power of the universe.”

The surprisingly effective secrecy surrounding the Manhattan Project meant that few were expecting an atomic bomb to appear during the current war. Many who helped make “Little Boy” – the bomb dropped on Hiroshima – possibly never knew what they were working

on. But what Truman meant by “atomic bomb” was common knowledge.

Long before August 6 1945, the public had a clear (and surprisingly accurate) idea of the kind of destruction that a bomb based on the liberation of nuclear energies would be capable of. So many writers explored the idea that the

early 20th century is sometimes called the “Radium Age” of science fiction.

Prominent scientists wrote popular books on how to experiment with radioactive substances at home. It was a concept as widely known as the Star Trek warp drive might be today.

The result was an intense public fascination with nuclear energies.

Crowds thronged museums to get a glimpse of a speck of radium, thrilled by what newspapers said was a fantastically powerful substance that “leaked” through radioactivity only a tiny fraction of the energy it stored. The great question of the age was whether scientists could find a way to tap that remaining energy, and – if they did – whether they could control it. Opinions varied.

FOR FULL REPORT LOG ON TO WWW.THECONVERSATION.COM

its seeds while still studying with us and who completed the four-year UG programme at the CIC, has raised $3 million from Accel and some other venture firms in the US. Another very thriving startup is TNine Infotech — named after the classroom where it was conceived at the CIC. Equally heartening is the highly innovative startup, Precisely, which is being run successfully by the current students of the CIC in cooperation with some of its former students. The quality and amount of research papers produced by the undergraduate students has been very impressive. For instance, a number of currently enrolled students at the CIC have produced a mathematical model of the manner in which they expected the coronavirus to spread in India. Their model has so far predicted with more than 95 per cent accuracy the spread of the coronavirus in the country.

WORD OF ADVICE If implemented properly, we should expect nothing but good outcomes from the recommendations in NEP 2020 that pertain to higher education. However, a word of caution is in order. Not ensuring the spirit of the NEP vision can also cause a lot of harm.

One of the most important of these dangers relates to the training and orientation of the teaching faculty.

The teaching staff in Indian universities have largely been schooled in the traditional manner and do not grasp the meaning and importance of trans-disciplinary education, project-based learning, and how knowledge can be linked to entrepreneurial activity. The NEP recommends establishing a National Professional Standards for Teachers by 2022 and their education, as reported by Hindustan Times, “will be gradually moved into multidisciplinary colleges and universities by 2030”.

Clearly, the NEP has all the ingredients of transforming India’s education system but implementation is the key.

And therein lies the danger..

THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY THE AUTHOR ARE PERSONAL

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TWEET Dharmendra Pradhan @dpradhanbjp Health and well-being of our citizens is a top-most priority of the #ModiGovt. I am sure this timely assistance and our united efforts will soon bear fruitful results for the country.

P. Chidambaram @PChidambaram_IN We must all raise our collective voice and demand that Ms Mehbooba Mufti be released forthwith and all those placed under house arrest be allowed the freedom they are entitled to under the Constitution.

Spiritual SPEAK

In my heart I store up your words, so I might not sin against you.

—Psalms 119:11

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INDIAN SECURITY AGENCIES SEEK SATELLITES FOR KEEPING CLOSE EYE ON CHINESE MILITARY MOVES

New Delhi: Seeking to keep a closer eye on the activities of the Chinese military both near the Indian territory as well as in its depth areas all along the 4,000 kilometre Line of Actual Control (LAC), the Indian security agencies feel there is a requirement of four to six dedicated satellites which can help them keep a check on the adversary's moves. The need has been felt after the Chinese Army in the garb of an exercise in the Xinjiang region on its side of the LAC mobilised more than 40,000 troops along with heavy weaponry and artillery and started rushing them towards Indian territory and transgressed into Indian territory at multiple locations surprising the Indian formations located in Leh including the 14 Corps headquarters.

"To improve the coverage of the activities of the Chinese troops and forces in both near

Document admitting Chinese intrusions vanishes from Defence Ministry site

A banner erected by the Indian Army near Pangong Tso lake near the India China border in Ladakh.

BACKED BY US, INDIA WARNS CHINA OVER KASHMIR INTERFERENCE Washington/New Delhi: The government warned China against attempts to interfere in India’s internal affairs after Beijing unsuccessfully initiated a discussion in the UN Security Council on J&K. In a statement issued by MEA, the government said that this Indian territory and in their depth areas, there is a need for four to six dedicated satellites with very high-resolution sensors and cameras giving ability to

was not the first time that China has sought to raise a subject that is solely an internal matter of India. “As on previous such occasions, this attempt too met with little support from the international community. We firmly reject China’s interference in keep a close watch even on the movement of small objects and individuals," defence sources told ANI. The capability and assets would also help

our internal affairs and urge it to draw proper conclusions from such unfructuous attempts.”

“The US will remain steadfast in support of India’s efforts to defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the letter addressed to EAM, S Jaishankar said. the country to reduce dependence on foreign associates to keep a watch on Chinese and other adversaries, they said.

The Indian Armed

New Delhi: China intruded into Indian territory in eastern Ladakh in early May, the Defence Ministry acknowledged in a document showing on the news section of its website since Tuesday. Two days after it was put up on the Ministry of Defence website, the page is missing.

"Chinese aggression has been increasing along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) and more particularly in Galwan valley since May 5, 2020. The Chinese side has Forces already have a few military satellites which are used for keeping a close watch on the adversaries but there is a need to further strengthen that capabil-

transgressed in the areas of Kungrang Nala, Gogra and north bank of Pangong Tso Lake on May 17-18," the ministry said in the document under the title "Chinese Aggression on LAC", in the "What's New" section on its website.

The document said ground level interactions were held between the armed forces of both sides to defuse the situation. A Corps commanders' flag meeting was held on June 6. "However, a violent face-off inciity, the sources said.

At the moment, Chinese troops have transgressed into Indian territory in Finger area along the Panging Tso lake where they are re-

‘Why is the PM lying?’ It's important Japan, India expand asks Rahul Gandhi our trade, business relations: Goyal

New Delhi: After the Defence Ministry's acknowledgement of Chinese troops transgressions into the Indian territory in different parts of Eastern Ladakh, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi asked why the PM was lying over the issue.

"Why is the PM lying?" a tweet by the Wayanad MP, which also had an English newspaper's article over Defence Ministry's acknowledgement embedded, read. Gandhi has time & again raised the issue, especially since Galwan valley clash which led to 20 Indian Army personnel losing their lives in a violent face-off with Chinese troops. Defence Ministry acknowledged Chinese transgressions in Indian territory in different parts of Eastern Ladakh —ANI

Priyank Gandhi Vadra @priyankagandhi Saifuddin Soj Sahab has played a big role in strengthening the Indian democracy.

By treating him like a prisoner, the BJP government is crushing democracy.

For the past one year there is tyranny in J-K. I want to remind the government that India is democractic republic,” Vadra’s tweet, which has also had a picture of Soz standing inside the boundary of his house with barbed wire fences on them.

‘NO COUNTRY CAN RUN ON HATRED’

New Delhi: It is important that Japan and India expand their trade and business relationships and the current partnership will expand through the proposed India-Japan Industrial Competitiveness Partnership, said Piyush Goyal, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry.

"Japan is one of our most trusted trading partners, fourth-largest contributor of FDI (foreign direct investment).

The current partnership will expand

fusing to disengage completely and want to create an observation post at Finger-5. In Gogra area also, they are maintaining some elements.

REMEMBERING SUSHMA SWARAJ

PM shares his speech from 2019 prayer meet

Japan is one of our most trusted trading partners, fourth-largest contributor of FDI. The current partnership will expand through proposed India-Japan Industrial Competitiveness Partnership, which was discussed during the meeting with Japan Minister Hiroshi San. —Piyush Goel, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry

through proposed India-Japan Industrial Competitiveness Partnership, which was discussed during the meeting with Japan Minister Hiroshi San," said Goyal while addressing the Digital Edition of

Make in India, Japan Roadshow 3.0.

"It is important Japan and India expand our trade and business relationships. Together, I have the confidence that we will come out successful in all mat-

ters," he added.

Goyal said as India is opening up for business, both the Centre and states are making strong policy decisions to help investors take advantage of growth opportunities. —ANI

IN THE COURTYARD

ED raids 17 places in Rs 177 cr J&K Bank loan fraud case New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorateis conducting searches at 17 locations in Punjab, Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir, including inthe premises of former J&K Finance Minister and senior NC leader Abdul Rahim Rather's son Hilal Ahmed Rather.

The searches are in connection with its

dent took place between the two sides on June 15, resulting in casualties on both sides."

Subsequently, said the document, a second corps commander level meeting took place on June 22 to discuss the modalities of de-escalation.

"While engagement and dialogue at military and diplomatic level is continuing to arrive at mutually acceptable consensus, the present standoff is likely to be prolonged," the ministry said. —ANI

Because of the lack of clarity about the Chinese activities, the Indian side took time to build up its numbers in Ladakh and additional forces had to be pumped in from adjoining areas and reserve formations were also moved there.

The Chinese have created a similar build up all along the LAC opposite Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh but the Chinese troops there are in depth areas. In the Ladakh sector, the Defence Ministry has now admitted that the Chinese troops have transgressed into Indian territory at multiple locations.

The Chinese had started the conflict with India on May 5, when they marched into the Galwan valley in very high numbers and tried to change the status quo on the LAC but the Indian forces managed to handle the situation well. —ANI

SC adjourns Vijay Mallya’s plea seeking review of 2017 order New Delhi: The SC adjourned to August 20 hearing on a plea filed by fugitive businessman Vijay Mallya seeking a review of its May 2017 order holding him guilty of contempt for

transferring USD 40 million to his children in violation of the court's order.

A bench of Justice UU Lalit and Justice Ashok Bhushan adjourned the matter for August 20. —ANI

probe into the Rs 177 crore J&K Bank loan fraud case, a top ED official said.

ED has registered a case of money laundering on the basis of a CBI FIR and a charge sheet. The CBI had registered the case on March 4. Rather was arrested by the anticorruption branch of the J&K Police on January 16. —ANI

Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Sushma Swaraj. —File Photo

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday remembered former Union Minister Sushma Swaraj on her first death anniversary.

Sushma Swaraj, who was External Affairs Minister in the first Modi cabinet, had passed away after a prolonged illness on August 6, last year.

Sharing the video of his speech at a prayer meet in her memory, PM Modi said that Sushma Swaraj served India selflessly and was an articulate voice for India at the world stage.

“Sushma Swaraj was a multifaceted personality and we, Karyakartas of the BJP have seen very closely what a great personality she was,” the PM had said in 2019 speech.

NARENDRA MODI @narendramodi Remembering Sushma Ji on her first Punya Tithi. Her untimely and unfortunate demise left many saddened. She served India selflessly and was an articulate voice for India at the world stage.

AMIT SHAH @AmitShah Tributes to Sushma Swaraj ji on her punyatithi.

Sushma ji was a towering figure of Indian polity, an outstanding parliamentarian and a brilliant orator who dedicated her entire life in the service of the nation. Her ideals will continue to inspire the generations to come.

Minister Manoj Sinha Kejri visits minor sexual assault victim Ex-Union appointed new J&K Lt Governor New Delhi: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday visited the 12-year-old girl at AIIMS on Thursday, two days after she was allegedly sexually assaulted and attacked in the national capital’s Paschim Vihar area.

Kejriwal told reporters that the government will make sure that those found guilty will get strict punishment.

“I have spoken to the Police Commissioner.

The police are trying to nab the accused. The govt will ensure strict

Police are trying to nab the accused. The govt will ensure strict punishment for the accused. Govt will provide Rs 10 lakh to her family members.

—Arvind Kejriwal, Delhi CM

VICTIM IS CRITICAL, SAYS DELHI CM

punishment for the accused. The govt will provide Rs 10 lakh to her family members,” he told reporters.

Kejriwal said, “The condition of the girl is very serious and she has grave injuries.

She is unconscious.

She was admitted in a very bad condition and is very critical. It will be observed in the next 24 to 48 hours whether she comes out of danger. Hope she recovers soon.”

Earlier, expressing his shock over the inci-

dent, the CM said, “The news of a violent crime with a 12-year-old girl has shaken the soul from inside. Criminals should not be allowed to roam around freely. I am going to AIIMS in a while to know the condition of the victim.”

Meanwhile, Congress workers staged a protest at AIIMS against the Delhi Govt over crime against women in the national capital.

Delhi Police had registered a case under the relevant sections after it came to light. —ANI

New Delhi: Former Union minister Manoj Sinha has been appointed as Jammu and Kashmir Lt Governor, a day after GC Murmu abruptly resigned. A Rashtrapati Bhawan communique on Thursday morning said the outgoing lieutenant governor's resignation has been accepted.

Murmu resigned on Wednesday night, exactly one year after the state of Jammu and Kashmir was downgraded and sliced into

two Union territories, the other one being Ladakh. Sinha was a minister in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government between 2014 and 2019 and has handled key ministries

like Telecom. He was BHU student union president leader and has won Lok Sabha elections twice from Ghazipur in eastern UP. He, however, lost the 2019 polls.Union minister Jitendra Singh, meanwhile, praised Sinha and said he carries with him "a rich combination of both political as well as administrative experience.”

Environment minister Prakash Javadekar also congratulated Sinha. —Agencies

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Centre releases Rs 890. 32 Cr COVID-19 package to 22 States & UTs for Emergency Response & Health System

GOVT STRENGTHENING COVID 19 TESTINGS New Delhi: The Central Government on Thursday released Rs 890.32 crores as the second installment of the COVID-19 Emergency Response and Health System Preparedness Package to 22 States and Union Territories (UTs).

“As part of this package, States/UTs have been strengthened with 5,80,342 isolation beds, 1,36,068 oxygen supported beds and 31,255 ICU beds. Also, 86,88,357 testing kits and 79,88,366 Vial Transport Media (VTM) have been procured by them. As many as 96,557 human resources have been added in the States/UTs and incentive has been given to 6,65,799 human resource. The package has aided provision of mobility support to 11,821 staff,” the health ministry said.

The first instalment of Rs 3,000 crores was released in April 2020 to all States/UTs to ramp up testing facilities, conduct activities with procurement of essential supplies. —ANI

India ramps up testing labs, access anywhere within 3 hrs

A health worker collects swab sample from a child at Ajmeri Gate in New Delhi.

Recovery rate reaches a record high of 67.62% New Delhi: The recovery rate has reached a record high of 67.62 per cent amongst COVID-19 patients and the Case Fatality Rate (CFR) stands at 2.07 per cent , said Union Health Ministry on Thursday.

“The total recoveries of COVID-19 patients have jumped to 13,28,336 with 46,121 COVID-19 patients being dis-

charged in the last 24 hours,” Ministry said in a statement.

The actual the active cases of the country is 5,95,501 is 30.31 per cent of the total positive cases. The active cases have seen a significant drop from to 30.31 per cent . The count includes 5,95,501 active cases and 13,28,337 cured patients. —ANI

—PHOTO BY PTI

East Asia on Thursday, the minister said that India’s proactive and graded multi-level institutional response to COVID-19 made it possible to have very low cases and deaths per million. The minister said the daily handling capacity of COVID-19 cases in hospitals has increased to almost 35 times. —ANI

New Delhi: India has ramped up its COVID-19 testing facility from one lab in January this year to 1,370 labs today and citizens anywhere can access a lab within three hours of travel time, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has said.

Addressing a virtual meeting of regional directors of WHO, South-

HOME MIN SHAH RECOVERING WELL, SAY HOSPITAL SOURCES

CPM LEADER SHYAMAL CHAKRABORTY DIES OF CORONA

New Delhi: Amit Shah’s health is constantly improving, informed sources from Medanta Hospital. He was admitted to the hospital after testing positive for COVID-19 and is undergoing treatment.Besides, congratulatory messages have been pouring in to him for the Bhumi Pujan ceremony of the Ram Temple.

Kolkata: Veteran CPM leader Shyamal Chakraborty passed away on Thursday.

76-year-old had tested corona positive and was admitted to a private hospital.

West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee condoled the death of veteran leader. “Saddened at the passing away of the veteran leader, former Mem-

A team of doctors too extended their greetings to Shah on the occasion. Although, he couldn’t be a part of the historic moment, he witnessed the programme on television.

ber of Parliament and former Bengal minister Shyamal Chakraborty. My condolences to his family, friends and supporters,” Banerjee said in a statement. —ANI

Plasma therapy trial did not show clinical benefits

New Delhi: The trial conducted by AIIMS for convalescent plasma therapy on COVID-19 patients did not show much clinical benefit in reducing fatality risk caused due to the virus.

“These are initial analyses. There were two groups of 15 patients each on whom a randomised control trial was done to know the effectiveness of plasma therapy. One group received standard treatment protocol while the other group received convalescent plasma therapy along with standard treatment. It was noted that mortality was similar with no much clinical benefits,” Dr Randeep Guleria, Director AIIMS. —ANI

16 NDRF teams pre-positioned in CBI registers case against Rhea Maharashtra, PM assures support Chakraborty and five others SUSHANT SINGH RAJPUT DEATH

New Delhi: After getting the notification from the Government of India, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday registered case against Rhea Chakraborty and 5 others.

The investigating agency booked 6 accused and others in sections including criminal conspiracy, abetment of suicide, wrongful restrain, wrongful confinement, theft, criminal breach of trust, cheating and criminal intimidation. CBI said it is also in touch with Bihar Police. “A case is, therefore, registered under section 341, 342, 380, 406, 420, 306, 506, 120B IPC against (I) Rhea Chakraborty and her family members (2) Sh. Indrajit Chakraborty (3) Sand-

hya Chakraborty, (4) Showik Chakraborty, (5) Samuel Miranda,

(6) Shruti Modi & others and entrusted to Anil Kumar Yadav, Ad-

ditional SP, CBI, ACVI, SIT, New Delhi for investigation,” read from content from FIR

by CBI. In S C, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the central govt, submitted before a singlejudge bench of Justice Hrishikesh Roy that the Centre has accepted the Bihar government’s request recommending a CBI inquiry into the Sushant death case. —ANI

Bihar police submits report to IG Patna: A team of four officers of Bihar Police probing the Sushant Singh Rajput death case in Mumbai, have reached Inspector General Central office to submit a report on the case on Thursday. These police officers have returned to the state

from Mumbai earlier on Thursday while the Patna (Central) Superintendent of Police (SP) Vinay Tiwari still continues to be quarantined in Mumbai.

The officers refrained from speaking about the findings of the case. One of the police officers, on arrival at

the Bihar airport, said that BMC never called to support us but have received great support from their seniors.

“Now when the case is with CBI, things would be confidential, we will be sharing our findings with them,” the other police officer added. —ANI

Mumbai: Due to the evolving situation of incessant rains, 16 teams of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) have been prepositioned in Maharashtra, said the NDRF. “Five teams in Mumbai, four teams in Kolhapur, two teams in Sangli, and one team each in Satara, Thane, Palghar, Nagpur, Raigad,” said NDRF. Meanwhile, different parts of Maharashtra are facing severe waterlogging and flood-like situation following incessant rainfall.

The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has predicted “generally cloudy sky with Heavy rain” in Thane on Thursday.

Vipin Sharma, Thane Municipal Corporation said, “Thane Municipal Corporation area has been receiving very heavy rainfall since the past three days, received 149 mm rainfall on August 5. We are alert. Assistant and Deputy

A tree falls on a car due to strong winds & heavy rainfall in Mumbai on Thursday. —PHOTO BY ANI

Commissioners, the fire brigade are on the field.

I appeal to residents to not step out of houses unnecessarily.”

IMD has also predicted intense rainfall over Mumbai over the next three hours. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday assured all support to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray regarding the situation in Mumbai and surrounding areas due to heavy rainfall. —ANI

BIHAR FLOODS: NDRF & SDRF DEPLOYED AS TOLL REACHES 19 Patna: Over 30 teams, including those of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and SDRF have been deployed to tackle the floods which have affected multiple districts in Bihar, according to the Disaster Management department of the state government.

According to the data

released by the department on Wednesday, 16 districts in the state have been affected by the rising waters. This has resulted in the loss of 19 human lives and affected a combined population of 66,60,655. A total of 12,202 people have been shifted to relief camps. —Agency

FROM PG 1 No final...

It had also ordered to publish these notices in the local papers of Barmer and Jaisalmer districts.

Disposing of a petition filed by Bahujan Samaj Party, which was represented by advocates Satish Mishra, Satpal Jain, Dinesh Garg and Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Madan Dilawar, represented by senior advocate Harish Salve and advocate Ashish Sharma, the division bench said that notice, issued earlier by a single judge bench of Justice Mahendra Goyal, should be delivered

to all six former BSP MLAs, by August 8.

Notably, during Thursday’s hearing, the Assembly Speaker was represented by Kapil Sibbal and Salman Khurshid and Prateek Kasliwal. It means that the single bench may not be able to take a final call on the issue of staying their voting rights on 11th August, a date which has been finalised by the CJ led bench.

The next two days 1213 August are holidays and the topic itself ends here. Now, there are two possibilities ie all BSP MLAs are allowed to vote in the session and

Gehlot emerges as a clear winner and the second chance may be that any judicial authority, may be High Court or Supreme Court, advises the assembly speaker to postpone the date of the session by a week or so, so that a final call on the voting issue could be taken by the HC or SC during this period.

So there is a mixed feeling in both Gehlot and Pilot camps and no one really knows which way the situation will take a turn. But one this is certain, that the issue of voting rights of BSP MLAs will be a major

deciding factor in the likely victory of Gehlot government in the assembly. However, apart from a keen and curious Pilot camp, the top leadership of Congress and BJP in New Delhi, are keeping their fingers crossed on the semifinal outcome on 11th August.

8 killed... and three female patients. The fire was likely caused by a short-circuit and a spark blazed the entire ICU unit in a couple of minutes.”

Several officials including the Additional Chief Secretary (ACS) Rajiv Kumar Gupta,

State Principal Secretary (health) Jayanti Ravi, Ahmedabad Municipal Commissioner Mukesh Kumar visited the hospital early on Thursday morning. After the police conducted a primary inspection of the fire site, officials of the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) collected relevant samples and the hospital was sealed.

Addressing the media, Ahmedabad COVID-19 nodal officer Rajiv Kumar Gupta, said, “Eight patients have unfortunately lost their lives in the fire that started at 3.30 am in Shrey Hospital.

Chief Minister Rupani has ordered an inquiry into the incident, to be led by additional chief secretaries of the state home department and the urban development department.”

Meanwhile, the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) said that the probe will be conducted by two Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officers – Additional Chief Secretary (ACS) of the State Home Department Sangeeta Singh and the ACS in the Urban Development Department Mukesh Puri. Both officials have been asked to submit a report within

three days. They held a meeting with officials of local civic body AMC at the Riverfront office in the presence of Chief Fire Officer Mehrnosh Dastoor. After concluding the meeting, the two senior bureaucrats then visited Shrey Hospital on Thursday afternoon.

RBI keeps...

“The MPC voted unanimously to leave the policy repo rate unchanged at 4 per cent and continue with the accommodative stance of monetary policy as long as necessary to revive growth, mitigate the impact of COVID-19

while ensuring that inflation remains within the target going forward,” said RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das. The headline inflation has breached the 6 per cent level, beyond the comfort level of the central bank. The RBI is tasked with keeping inflation at 4 per cent in the medium-term with a 2 percentage point leeway on either side.

On the economic growth, Das said India’s real gross domestic product (GDP) will contract in the first half of FY21 as well as full financial year. He did not put any number to it.

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A

strology is a meme, and it’s spreading in that blooming, unfurling way that memes do.

On social media, astrologers and astrology meme machines amass tens or hundreds of thousands of followers, people joke about Mercury retrograde, and categorize “the signs as ...” literally anything: cat breeds, Oscar Wilde quotes, Stranger Things characters, types of french fries. In online publications, daily, weekly, and monthly horoscopes, and zodiac-themed listicles flourish.

This isn’t the first moment astrology’s had and it won’t be the last.

The practice has been around in various forms for thousands of years. More recently, the New Age movement of the 1960s and ’70s came with a heaping helping of the zodiac.

In the decades between the New Age boom and now, while astrology certainly didn’t go away—you could still regularly find horoscopes in the back pages of magazines—it “went back to being a little bit more in the background,” says Chani Nicholas, an astrologer based in Los Angeles.

“Then there’s something that’s happened in the last five years that’s given it an edginess, a relevance for this time and place, that it hasn’t had for a good 35 years. Millennials have taken it and run with it.”

Many people I spoke to for this piece said they had a sense that the stigma attached to astrology, while it still exists, had receded as the practice has grabbed a foothold in online culture, especially for young people.

In some ways, astrology is perfectly suited for the internet age. There’s a low barrier to entry, and nearly endless depths to plumb if you feel like falling down a Google research hole.

The availability of more in-depth information online has given this cultural wave of astrology a certain erudition—more jokes about Saturn returns, fewer “Hey baby, what’s your sign?” pickup lines.

SOURCE: WEB CONCEPT: RAKSHITA PAREEK DESIGN: ABHISHEK GUPTA

A QUICK PRIMER Astrology is not a science; there’s no evidence that one’s zodiac sign actually correlates to personality. But the system has its own sort of logic.

Astrology ascribes meaning to the placement of the sun, the moon, and the planets within 12 sections of the sky—the signs of the zodiac. You likely know your sun sign, the most famous zodiac sign, even if you’re not an astrology buff. It’s based on where the sun was on your birthday.

But the placement of the moon and each of the other planets at the time and location of your birth adds additional shades to the picture of you painted by your “birth chart.”

What horoscopes are supposed to do is give you information about what the planets are doing right now, and in the future, and how all that affects each sign. “Think of the planets as a cocktail party,” explains Susan Miller, the popular astrologer who founded the Astrology Zone website. “You might have three people talking together, two may be over in the corner arguing, Venus and Mars may

be kissing each other. I have to make sense of those conversations that are happening each month for you.”

Astrology expresses complex ideas about personality, life cycles, and relationship patterns through the shorthand of the planets and zodiac symbols. And that shorthand works well online, where symbols and shorthand are often baked into communication.

ASTROLOGY AS STRESS BUSTER? People tend to turn to astrology in times of stress. A small 1982 study by the psychologist Graham Tyson found that “people who consult astrologers” did so in response to stressors in their lives—particularly stress “linked to the individual’s social roles and to his or her relationships,” Tyson wrote. “Under conditions of high stress, the individual is prepared to use astrology as a coping device even though under low-stress conditions he does not believe in it.”

According to American Psychological Association survey data, since 2014, Millennials have been the most stressed generation, and also the generation most likely to say their stress has increased in the past year since 2010. Millennials and Gen Xers have been significantly more stressed than older generations since 2012. If stress makes astrology look shinier, it’s not surprising that more seem to be drawn to it now.

Astrology offers those in crisis the comfort of imagining a better future, a tangible reminder of that clichéd truism that is nonetheless hard to remember when you’re in the thick of it: This too shall pass.

A combination of stress and uncertainty about the future is an ailment for which astrology can seem like the perfect balm.

Humans are narrative creatures, constantly explaining their lives and selves by weaving together the past, present, and future (in the form of goals and expectations).

AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

something else in this era of quantified selves, and tracked locations, and indexed answers to every possible question. Except, perhaps the questions of who you really are, and what life has in store for you.

BURGEONING INTEREST IN ASTROLOGY But a sincere burgeoning interest in astrology doesn’t mean people are wholesale abandoning rationality for more mystical beliefs. Nicholas Campion, a historian of astrology, points out that the question of whether people “believe” in astrology is both impossible to answer, and not really a useful question to ask. People might say they don’t “believe” in astrology, but still identify with their zodiac sign. They may like to read their horoscope, but don’t change their behavior based on what it says. There is more nuance than this statistic allows for.

Many mainstream examinations of astrology as a trend are deeply concerned with debunking. They like to trot out the National Science Foundation survey that measures whether people think astrology is scientific, and remind readers that it’s not. Which, it’s not. But that’s not really the point.

While there are surely some people who blindly accept astrology as fact and view it as on par with a discipline like biology, that doesn’t seem

THE NE W

07

to be the case among many of the young adults who are fueling this renaissance of the zodiac. The people I spoke to for this piece often referred to astrology as a tool, or a kind of language—one that, for many, is more metaphorical than literal.

Studies have shown that if you write a generic personality description and tell someone it applies to them, they’re likely to perceive it as accurate—whether that’s in the form of a description of their zodiac sign or something else.

It might be that Millennials are more comfortable living in the borderlands between skepticism and belief because they’ve spent so much of their lives online, in another space that is real and unreal at the same time. That so many people find astrology meaningful is a reminder that something doesn’t have to be real to feel true. Don’t we find truth in fiction?

To understand astrology’s appeal is to get comfortable with paradoxes. It feels simultaneously cosmic and personal; spiritual and logical; ineffable and concrete; real and unreal. It can be a relief, in a time of division, not to have to choose. It can be freeing, in a time that values black and white, ones and zeros, to look for answers in the gray. It can be meaningful to draw lines in the space between moments of time, or the space between pinpricks of light in the night sky, even if you know deep down they’re really light-years apart, and have no connection at all.

ASTROLO GY

PREDICTIONS WORK AS COMFORTING MAGIC For some, astrology’s predictions function like Dumbo’s feather—a comforting magic to hold onto until you realize you could fly on your own all along. But it’s the ineffable mystical sparkle of the feather—gentler and less draining than the glow of a screen—that makes people reach for it in the first place.

People are starting to get sick of a life lived so intensely on the grid. They wish for more anonymity online. They’re experiencing fatigue with ebooks, with dating apps, with social media.

They’re craving

AGE O F

IN A STRESSFUL, DATA-DRIVEN ERA, MANY YOUNG PEOPLE FIND COMFORT AND INSIGHT IN THE ZODIAC—EVEN IF THEY DON’T EXACTLY BELIEVE IN IT

2ND FRONT

Do not focus on the fears in your mind. Focus and be led by the dreams in your heart.

—Jagdeesh Chandra, CEO & Editor, First India

AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

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Covid or no Covid, Guj HC clears record 73.77% cases in July As asked by Chief Justice Vikram Nath, the HC prepared a performance report

08

Oza tenders apology, SC asks HC to consider it

Shishir Awasthi Ahmedabad: Working from home, holding video hearings and attending to hopeful litigants amid the unprecedented Covid-19 crisis, the judges of the Gujarat High Court religiously stuck to their bounden duty of delivering justice and disposed of as many as 73.77% of cases during July.

According to the high court’s second monthly report for July, the judges cleared 3,128 cases, including 1,799 criminal matters. (See Box) The performance report, prepared on the directions of Chief Justice Vikram Nath, contains statistics on the number of matters filed, registered, and disposed of in the month of July. The re-

Gujarat is top tax-compliant State, next is Delhi First India Bureau Ahmedabad: Gujarat has become the highest tax-compliant State in the assessment year 2018-19 in terms of the proportion of ‘returns filed to PAN holders’, while Bihar saw the lowest rate of Income Tax Return (ITR) filing.

In AY19, the state witnessed 22.3 per cent ITR filers, out of the total PAN card holders.

Gujarat was followed

by Delhi with 20.5 per cent population filing ITR. Next were Punjab with 16.74 per cent and Telangana with 16.68 per cent ITR filing.

Bihar received the lowest rate of ITR filing at 5 per cent with Uttar Pradesh reporting a slightly higher rate at 8.11 per cent.

However, it was much below the national average of 12 per cent.

GUJARAT HIGH COURT’S ‘VIRTUAL’ PERFORMANCE REPORT Cases listed for hearing 9,408 Civil 3,715

Criminal 5,693

Number of Judgments/ Orders passed 7,414 Judgments 50

7,364 Number of cases filed over email 5,000

Cases disposed of 3,128 Civil 1,329

Criminal 1799

Orders

Civil 2,000

Criminal 3,000

(Source: Gujarat High Court’s Second Monthly Report for July, 2020) —FILE PHOTO

Gujarat High Court.

port also classifies them by their type and the nature of relief sought.

The report also takes note of the two occasions when the Court was suspended, the first time from July 8, 2020 to July 12,

and later on July 15.

This was necessitated by the reports of coronavirus infections among two dozen staff of the court’s Registry.

Over the month, the court also organised two online awareness sessions for advocates

practising at the high court. These sessions were organised to instruct advocates about the modalities of using the Zoom video conferencing application.

Beginning July 30, each matter is being as-

signed a serial number to serve as a reference for the matter being mentioned. Depending on when the request for a mention is made, the matter is circulated to the appropriate Bench on the same day or even prior.

Around 2,000 civil and 3,000 criminal cases were filed over email, the report states. The figures are inclusive of interim applications.

Interestingly, all the 20 civil writ petitions were public interest litigations.

Man kills daughter for affair with Muslim boy First India Bureau

with a club used to wash clothes at their home in Shah Nagar-4 in Gandhigram area around 8 am on Thursday.

Police said when the girl refused to have tea or even water till she was allowed to marry the boy she had an affair with, her father lost his temper. In a fit of anger, he hit her on the head with a club 2 to 3

Rajkot: A man allegedly clubbed his 20-year-old daughter to death in a fit of rage after she insisted on marrying a Muslim boy in Rajkot’s Gandhigram area on Thursday.

Police said that Gopal Nakum, a casual labourer, allegedly hit his daughter Ila

times till she fell unconscious on the floor.

Police said that later a neighbour dialled the emergency number to call an ambulance. The ambulance van took her to the PDU Hospital where she succumbed to her injuries at 1:50 pm. The girl had eloped with the 19-year-old boy earlier but she was sent back since he is not of marriageable age.

Gujarat High Court Advocates Association president Yatin Oza.

First India Bureau New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday took note of an unconditional apology by bar association president Yatin Oza, whose designation as a senior advocate was withdrawn after his critical comments, and said Gujarat High Court would consider it in the pending contempt proceedings against him.

The high court had decided to recall its order conferring designation of senior advocate to Oza who is now the president of Gujarat High Court Advocates Association, taking umbrage of his alleged remarks against the court and its registry in a Facebook live press conference.

“The contempt proceedings are still pending and in view of his unconditional apology be-

High Court orders CID probe in Vadodara custodial death First India Bureau Ahmedabad: Alarmed by the delay in the investigations and no arrests in the sensational Vadodara custodial death, the Gujarat High Court has transferred the case to the State CID (Crime) with a direction that the probe be handled by a DSP-level officer.

The court has also asked the State DGP to assign a Deputy Inspector-General level officer

to oversee the investigations by the CID. Transferring the case, the court has observed that if it remains with the Vadodara police there are chances of the accused cops thwarting the investigation.

A division bench of Justice Sonia Gokani and Justice NV Anjaria was shocked that none of the 6 accused policemen had been arrested in the alleged custodial murder of Telangana

fore the full court, we consider it appropriate that the contempt court itself first applies its mind to the issue.

The petitioner (Oza) has no hesitation in saying that he has apologized unconditionally and will apologise unconditionally in the contempt proceedings and pray for bringing to closure those proceedings,” a bench headed by Justice S K Kaul said in its order.

“We may note that the petitioner himself has been quite apologetic before us and states that he should not have used the words he used and those words were used in the heat of the situation where everybody is troubled by the prevailing problem of COVID and the grievances of the younger members of Bar,” the bench said.

BEARDING THE KING!

resident Shaikh Babu Nisar after a month of the filing of FIR. Nisar mysteriously went missing after December 10, 2019, when he was taken to Fatehgunj police station in Vadodara for interrogation in a theft case. The high court ordered that all relevant documents be sent to CID (Crime) through a “special messenger” without delay since a long time had already elapsed.

Dr Anshuman, Deputy Conservator of Forests, East Gir, on Thursday tweeted a picture of the lion in his den. He wrote, “Gir Forest is considered very sacred by the local people and all its inhabitants are The Blessed Ones. So celebrate #worldlionday2020 as a festival.”

—PHOTO CLICKED BY SAMEER DEVMURARI

CRIMINAL GENIUS

BOLLYWOOD ‘LIVE’: Real life ‘Dolly Ki Doli’ cons 3 husbands This Jharkhand woman conned rich men, including a Gujarati, to marry her and then decamped with huge money l

First India Bureau Ahmedabad: In what seems to be a real-life enactment of the Bollywood film ‘Dolly ki Doli’, where the lead actress plays a bride who specialises in conning men into marrying her and then robbing them of

their wealth, a woman from Chhatra in Jharkhand did the same with 3 rich men.

She approached them, one of them being from Gujarat, through matrimonial site shaadi.com and talked her ‘victims’ into marrying her.

A complaint has been lodged against a woman for conning men.

The woman first contacted a Giridihbased man and married him to later flee with Rs 1 crore. Her next victim was a Gujarat-based man whom she married and lived with him for some time and then, on finding the right opportunity, decamped with a whopping Rs 45 crore.

Her confidence only increased after this.

The next, and the third victim, was a man in Pune. In this case, she not only married him

but fled the country with him to California.

But her game seemed to be over when the mother of the Pune man and the Gujaratbased person registered a complaint against her for duping them in Rajkot.

The Jharkhand police are investigating the woman’s passport details. According to investigators, the woman would look for rich men, she would stay with them for a while after marriage and then flee with all the

valuables.

The police of the Iteri police station in Chhatra district investigated the case of a fake passport hiding the husband’s name.

The investigations have revealed that the young woman was first married by the Hindu customs on April 27, 2015, with the Rajdhanwar resident of Giridih, Nilaya Kumar. She got married at the Hotel Element at Station Road in Ranchi.

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09

AHMEDABAD, FRIDAY AUGUST 7, 2020

MATCHMAKING!

People in India still seem intrigued by the idea of arranged matchmaking- let’s find out why!

RASHI CHAUDHARY cityfirst@firstindia.co.in

G

iven the current climate, marriages might seem like a thing of the past.

However, the popularity of the Netflix original ‘Indian Matchmaking,’ has got everyone envisioning their special day. It appears that despite the drawbacks and the seemingly emotional toll the union takes on everyone involved, people still seem intrigued by the idea of arranged matchmaking.

It makes one wonder how, despite changing times and increased acceptance of love marriage, what is making adolescents so drawn to the idea of an arranged marriage?

Until a couple of decades ago, the words love marriage couldn’t even be uttered in the household with-

out warranting a thrashing.

Growing up, children knew that the person they were going to marry would be someone their parents chose for them and that they wouldn’t have a say in the matter. This made love marriages seem forbidden and intriguing and what in turn gave rise to its appeal. As a result, young adolescents were drawn to the concept of love marriage as a way to rebel against their parents, and the society they grew up in. On the contrary, in the 21st century, the wide acceptance of love and marrying for it, has made the whole concept unattractive and vanilla.

If not appeal alone, the popularity of “no strings attached” relationships and the distraction that is social media interfering with normal communication, a long-lasting relationship seems almost impossible to achieve.

Teenagers are only interested in having fun and view baring their emotions as a sign of weakness. This generation of commitment-phobic individuals, unable to sustain meaningful relationships, has hence decided to place their bets on arranged marriage as the only way of finding a long-lasting partner.

The author is a student at Boston University, majoring in Communications.

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10

AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

‘THE JUBILEE KUMAR’ beatable with 100 percent box office success. Dil Ek Mandir, Dhool Ka Phool, Arzoo, Sangam, Mere Mehboob, Suraj, Ganwaar, and many more were the addition to his volley of non-stop blockbusters. Kumar also starred in Punjabi films like Teri meri ek Jindari. People crowned him Jubilee Kumar as his multiple films completed more than 25 weeks at the box office. Kumar was awarded a Ph.D. During his lifetime, he was known for not taking any medication. He surrendered before cancer on July 12, 1999, just 8 days before his 70th birthday. He received many awards like National Honor by Late Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, special Shastri National Award and the Justice of Peace honor. He was also honored with the prestigious Padma Shri Award in 1969. He was also a man of sound investment sense, and rapidly became one of the richest men in the industry.

GURMAN SINGH cityfirst@firstindia.co.in

V

eteran Actor and Superstar Rajendra Kumar were one of the most talented actors of the Hindi cinema. Kumar was not inclined towards playing hero roles and hence, he started his film career as an assistant director to H. S. Rawail in films like Patanga, Sagai, Pocketmaar. Rajendra Kumar made his debut with a small role in Jogan that featured actors Dilip Kumar and Nargis. Later, he got a break in 1955 film Vachan, the film was a silver jubilee hit and he was titled as ‘A Star is Born’. He got further success with his supporting role in Mehboob Khan’s blockbuster film Mother India in 1957 in which he played Nargis’s character’s son. His first major success as a romantic leading man was in Amit Saxena’s musical Goonj Uthi Shehnai (1959), co-starring Ameeta. Rajendra, was slowly tiptoeing his way to stardom, became the next best option after Dilip Kumar for

the industry that wanted a reasonably priced star with the same ability to move the viewers. He appeared in over 80 movies. Between 1959 and 1966,

Rajendra Kumar had such a Midas touch that almost any film he touched turned box office gold, and especially from 1963 to 1966, when he was un-

FA CE OF TH ED AY

Whenever this song plays Kaun Hai Jo Sapnon Mein Aaya, it always reminds me of actor Rajendra Kumar sitting in a car, mesmerizing us with his romantic appeal. He acted in diversified subjects including the relationship of poets in the film Palki, patriotic subject matters in the film Dharti, the role of dacoits in Gora Aur Kala. —KUNAL SENANI

YOUR DAY Horoscope by Saurabbh Sachdeva

Rajendra Kumar

ARIES

TAURUS

GEMINI

CANCER

There is a happy atmosphere at home today and you will simply relax and breathe fresh air. You may be willing to transform your house by reconstructing but pandemic situation could become a hindrance. Your cards shows a promising health.

Seniors from your family office will be highly impressed with your ideas on the new project and your strategies on how to go about it. You will benefit from healthy eating so try it. You will take some time off from work to spend quality time with your children.

You are craving for a change as you are bored of your current routine in life.

You will get in touch with your lost relatives and things will be better than ever before. Returns from property business will help you in investing in other businesses to cope up with pandemic losses.

Some relative may visit your house for something important. Those looking for suitable accommodation will surely find one. On academic front, you mostly like to be friends with known personalities but remember a true friendship is not based on any motive or factors.

MAR 21 - APR 20

MAY 21 - JUNE 21

JUNE 22 - JULY 23

LEO

VIRGO

LIBRA

SCORPIO

You are a responsible professional and people like you for your optimism. You are turning into this health conscious person and people around you will love this new you.

Investments are under your control and you have worked very hard to be at the current position.

You have taken fitness as a challenge and you will shock everyone with your dedication and results.

Spiritual awakening is on the cards so follow any path which leads to your enlightenment.Your work contribution on professional front will give your image a must needed boost.

You will make profits as far as earnings are concerned.

You have a good married life where the foundation is built from trust and respect.

Managing an organisation is not a child’s play and you are doing a commendable job. You will find yourself free of pain that you had.

You will have fun at home today. You will do incredibly well in academics and your parents couldn’t be more proud. You have started devoting more time to your spouse and you both are closer than ever. Calm and slow music makes you think deeper.

JULY 24 - AUGUST 23

AUG 24 - SEP 23

SEPT 24 - OCTOBER 22

OCT 23 - NOVEMBER 22

SAGITTARIUS

CAPRICORN

AQUARIUS

PISCES

Exercise routine has proved to be very beneficial for health. You may crave for something that isn’t good for you so please resist your temptations. You are a rising star on academic front and your hard work is your biggest asset. Your lover want to you do decide about your future.

Don’t let a simple discuss with parents become an argument. You may finally get the scholarship that you have been replying on for your building your future. In social events, you used to be in spot light for your fashion sense and confidence but all that’s is a things of the past for now.

You will pass the interview but do the job only if that’s what you want to do in your life. You are energetic and always walk the extra mile when you get your mind onto something. You will be part of a big social event but via video call . Exquisite site will catch your attention for a new house.

You are very happy with yourself and that’s what keeps your parents smiling. You will have a lot of fun on romantic front. Your parents will help you in times of financial crisis be rest assured but first you must try on your own to get out of it, remember there is a way.

NOV 23 - DEC 22

NAGMA MIRAJKAR, Content Creator

APR 21 - MAY 20

DEC 23 - JAN 20

JAN 21 - FEB 19

FEB20 - MARCH 20

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TESTED +VE

B

AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

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‘IT WILL BE AN ABSOLUTE HONOUR’ A

ctor Vaani Kapoor recently spoke about her interests to work in a biopic of astronaut Kalpana Chawla.

The ‘Befikre’ actor said, “I would love to do a biopic!

Kalpana Chawla is a huge role model for women around the world and anyone who has ever dreamt of being an astronaut. She’s an inspiration and her story is definitely the one to be celebrated and told. I would really really want to play her on-screen, it’ll be an absolute honour.” The 31-year-old star seems to be making her intent clear to do a project that was once rumoured to be looking for Priyanka Chopra and Deepika Padukone to helm the affairs. The actor feels she would love to take the risk as an artist and try her hand at doing the biopic and also experiment with several genres in her career span.

Talking about the roles she has essayed on the big screen so far, Kapoor added, “I’ve tried to pick the best from what came my way and it feels amazing to have worked with some of the best in the industry. I have been able to get opportunities for roles so distinctive. From a small-town girl Tara in Shudh Desi Romance to a girl who’s French in Befikre, to an independent single mother in War, to a completely different era in Shamshera, it’s been pretty good.”

The actor added, “However, there are many more films one desires to be part of, genres like action, comedy, romcoms, drama, suspense, thriller, all and many more versatile roles to discover.” Vani Kapoor has got two major projects in the pipeline, including ‘Shamshera’ and ‘Bell Bottom’. —ANI

Disha Patani with her father

ollywood actress Disha Patani’s father and two other officers of the vigilance unit of the Uttar Pradesh power department, have tested positive for the Coronavirus.

Disha’s father, Jagdish Patani, is a deputy SP in the vigilance unit of the state power department here. Jagdish Patani and the two other officers were investigating a transformer scam. They had come to Bareilly from Lucknow. Following their corona test reports, the zonal chief engineer’s office has been closed for the next 48 hours. —Agency

STAR OF SKY

Vaani Kapoor

Late Sameer Sharma

‘Keep calm and wear a mask’

S

ameer Sharma, who has been a part of many popular shows including Yeh Rishtey Hain Pyaar Ke, Geet Hui Sabse Parayi, Iss Pyaar Ko Kya Naam Doon, was found hanging from his kitchen ceiling on Thursday morning. The Police suspect that the actor committed suicide two days back looking at the condition of the body and no suicide note was recovered from the body, as per the report.

—Agency

L

eading by an example, actor Preity Zinta on Wednesday shared stunning pictures from a glamorous photo-shoot where the actor is seen sporting a face mask.

The ‘Kya Kehna’ actor put out several pictures of herself from the photoshoot on Instagram and urged people to wear masks and stay protected amid the coronavirus pandemic. In the captures, the ‘Dil Hai Tumhaara’ actor looks breathtakingly beautiful as she sports a pink dress off-shoulder dress with dangling threads while she ties her hair in a high pony, and lets her luscious curly locks loose. In the snaps, Zinta is also seen sporting a matching decorated mask, as she looks into the camera while striking a pose. The ‘Kal Ho Naa Ho’ actor accessorised her special look with diamondstudded dangler earrings, a necklace and a bracelet.

“Keep calm and wear a mask #projectsanity #Fashion #shoot #ting,” wrote the actor as a caption to the post.

—ANI

BEST COLLAB

... her post Selena Gomez and Taylor Swift

Preity Zinta

I

t’s hard to believe that Selena Gomez and Taylor Swift have never collaborated on a song together.

The best friends, whose friendship has lasted for more than a decade and counting, have proved time and again that they’re always going to be there for each other through thick and thin.

Moreover, Gomez and Swift are each other’s hype machines as evidenced by their social media love for their works as well as being the loudest cheerleaders during their award show performances.

During a surprise appearance on Twitch’s Animal Talking, Selena was asked about her dream Moreover, when it was noted that such a thick friendship would definitely lead to future collaboration, Gomez coyly teased, “You never know.”

—Agency

SADAK 2’s DATE OUT

M

akers of Alia Bhatt and Aditya Roy Kapur-starrer love saga -’Sadak 2’ - on Thursday announced that the much-awaited second instalment of the franchise will premiere on online video streaming platform Disney+ Hotstar on August 28.

Alia Bhatt took to Instagram to share a new poster of the film and to announce its release date. The poster features Bhatt, and Kapur walking beside Sanjay Dutt on a road leading to the mountains.

The poster features the three from their backs.

While Dutt is seen walking bare hands, Bhatt is seen carrying a bag on her back and Kapur is seen carrying a guitar on his back. “Sadak 2, the road to love streaming on @DisneyPlusHotstarVIP from 28 August.” Besides the three actors, the film also features Pooja Bhatt, who along with Sanjay Dutt, was in the first installment.

‘Sadak 2’ marks filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt’s comeback as a director after 21 years.

—ANI

‘Thank You, Next’

A

riana Grande might be blessing fans with a Sweetener Tour movie!

The new concert film will follow the 27-yearold on her big 2019 tour, starting with the release of her album

‘Thank U, Next’. There’s currently a bidding war for the rights to the doc, with Netflix and YouTube being among the top contenders.

“Ariana’s team are negotiating a huge deal between a number of big hitters, with Netflix and YouTube both showing interest,” a source told the site. “Netflix has put forward a starting offer of $5 million to get the rights. The deal is being negotiated by Ariana’s closest advisers, led by Scooter Braun.”

—Agency

Alia Bhatt Ariana Grande

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TECHNOLOGY

AHMEDABAD | FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2020

12

A DAY TO REMEMBER!

ENABLED LEARNING Jagdeesh Chandra felicitates Senior Editor Syed Umar and his team on the day of the Ram Mandir Janambhoomi Pujan.

Seen with them are (from left) Khushbu, Divya, Aditi, Anita and Nandini.

HAPPY B’DAY!

ANUBHA JAIN

Congress Leader Suraj Khatri celebrated his birthday on 6 August, Thursday.

Many leaders greeted him on his special day. We wish him all the best!

cityfirst@firstindia.co.in

I

ndia is still lacking behind on the digital front especially in the rural sector. Owing to the poor IT infrastructure, technology-enabled learning is yet a dream for many. To make the underprivileged people digitally equipped and to bring more transparency in the working culture, the “Sankya Vidya Foundation” (SVF) is bridging the gap of digital learning.

‘Sankya’ is a vision of five passionate Rotarians and IT industry veterans, viz., M.N.Suresh, Mohan Ramanathan, S.Jayaraman, Suresh Bhat, and Chander P.Mannar. While working as the senior manager in HewlettPackard, Mohan Ramanathan

THE HAPPENINGS!

noticed that with technological advancement, computers in absolutely perfect conditions were being discarded by the IT industry after every two to three years. The machines as garbage dumped in a warehouse with high paying rents. And then the idea germinated to inculcate technology in the domain of education. These IT Professionals use the discarded computer machines of HP, CISCO, Accenture, and TCS, etc.

The foundation at all India level provides the refurbished computer machines with the desired software installed to the needy students, skill develop-

In the memory of...

ment centers, NGOs, visually challenged people, and children with special needs through the service organization called “ROTARY”. Any cost towards this and the maintenance are generally sponsored by the Rotary. From logistics, installation to maintenance everything is being taken care of by the foundation and Rotary.

SVF is supporting blind people also and has given over 2000 laptops to them with specially designed ‘Text speech’ program installed. Through the ewaste management system SVF also suggests its beneficiaries about disposing of donated computers.

RAJASTHAN: On the 79th death anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore, a theatrical play ‘DAKGHAR’ will be screened on Jawahar Kala Kendra’s (JKK) Facebook page today at 7 pm. The play is directed by Sanket Jain and written by Rabindranath Tagore which revolves around a young boy who interacts with everyone passing by his window after the doctor has ordered him to be confined in the room.

It was the birthday of Deva Ram Saini, OSD to CM Ashok Gehlot on 6 August, Thursday, though he did not celebrate it as he has recently lost his father. He took blessings from his mother on this special day and spent the day at work as usual.

PROMOTE INDIGENOUS

WEAVERS T CITY FIRST

Amit Dhariwal, son of Shanti Dhariwal remembered his beloved mother on her fifth death anniversary with heartfelt words of love.

Amit Dhariwal

o celebrate the occasion of 6th National Handloom Day, a webinar on ‘Save the Weave’ featuring Smriti Irani, Union Minister of Textiles and Minister of Women and Child Development in conversation with Sadhguru, Fo u n d e r- I s h a Foundation is going to be organised today at 7.30 pm. The conversation is part of the ‘In Conversation with the Mystic series’ and will focus on national efforts to save the rich, unique weaves native to India. The session

Glorious Achievement CITY FIRST

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aipur National University has brought glory to the state by securing All India rank 22 among the top Private Universities of India.

The ranking secured in a survey conducted by India Today on the Best Universities of India bears full testimony to the rich academic experience that the Univer-

sity provides to scholars that become a part of the beautiful, and vibrant campus.

The consistency in maintaining its ranks through the years contrasts with the loss of rank by many other institutes that were once deemed to be leaders in their field. The major

parameter leading to this notable rank is the governance of the University among various others things. Chancellor of JNU, Dr Sandeep Bakshi congratulated his team of academicians for their unfaltering commitment and expressed his hope that the coming years would witness even higher rankings and more exemplary contributions from all stakeholders.

will be moderated by Lavina Baldota, a patron of arts and crafts, who has been tirelessly working with the weavers to create exquisite handcrafted textiles.

Known as much for his sartorial sense as his wit and wisdom, Sadhguru has often spoken about synthetic textiles being one of the largest polluters. Last year, Sadhguru

launched ‘Save the Weave’, a movement to raise visibility and awareness about the art and science of the eco-friendly Indian weaves and the plight of the dwindling indigenous weavers. The campaign promotes natural-fibre clothing as a healthy and nonpolluting alternative to synthetics that can breathe new life into a dying craft. cityfirst@firstindia.co.in

RAJASTHAN: Jaipur Citizen Forum (JCF) is going to organise a webinar series ‘Hum Tum 11’ with Sister Shivani on 9 August at 5 pm. The session will be moderated by J.K Jajoo.

RAJASTHAN: The Global Teej Celebration organised by Rajasthan Foundation was held on Thursday, at 7:30 pm, in which Rajasthanis from England, Egypt, Netherlands, North America, and Dubai celebrated the occasion together virtually, with utter love and joy.

RAJASTHAN: Team Cybotians from RIET College, Bhankrota secured the first position in Smart India Hackathon 2020 which was organised virtually where the team presented the design of a Machine Learning Program to classify fake news circulation on social media platforms exclusively for Bureau of Police Research and Development. Being the winner, the team won a prize of Rs. 1 Lac.

MAHARANA PRATAP STATUE CITY FIRST

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n the occasion of Bhoomi Pujan in Ayodhya, Bharati Shilpkala made the grand statue of Maharana Pratap which is going to be installed in Ayodhya next week. During the occasion, the lamps were lighted, a saffron flag was hosted and the prasad was distributed to celebrate the day. Many Rama devotees attended the ceremony. Sculptor Mahavir Bharti shared that the team of 15 people has worked continuously for 7 months to make a 12 feet statue of Maharana Pratap.

RAJASTHAN: FICCI FLO, Jaipur organised a workshop on ‘Past Life Regression’ on Thursday, where a spiritual scientist, Secretary of Association for Regression and Reincarnation Research, Dr Raajshekar Potluri was invited as a speaker to explain the theory of past life regression scientifically. The session was organised to enlighten the FLO members about the connection between science and the soul.