CHANDIGARH: The Bhagwant Mann-led AAP government in Punjab announced 300 units of free electricity to households from July 1.

The announcement was made in advertisements published by the state’s information and public relations department in various newspapers on Saturday.

It was related to a 30-day report card of the AAP government in Punjab.

A formal announcement is expected to be made later on Saturday.

Giving 300 units of free electricity was one of the major poll promises of the Aam Aadmi Party in the Punjab assembly election.

Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann had on Thursday said in Jalandhar that “good news” would be announced on April 16.

Punjab was already providing free electricity to the farming sector.

It also provides 200 units of free power to all Scheduled Castes, backward castes and the below poverty line households.

According to former AIIMS- Bhopal director Dr Sarman Singh, who served from June 4, 2018 to November 8,  2021, and also had the additional charge of Bibinagar (Telangana) AIIMS, presiding over two institutes is a challenging task which hampers policy decisions and other governing issues of the institute. 

Dr S Ramji, executive director of AIIMS-Kalyani (West Bengal) was entrusted with the additional charge of AIIMS-Guwahati as director in February this year. 

This newspaper contacted officials in Union health ministry, but there were no comments despite repeated attempts. 

A parliamentary committee panel had also expressed concern over shortage of staff at six AIIMS — Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Jodhpur, Patna, Raipur and Rishikesh.

Dr Saurabh Varshney, Executive Director of AIIMS-Deoghar, is holding additional charge of Patna-AIIMS. 

Mukesh Tripathi, Director of Mangalagiri (Andhra Pradesh) AIIMS, has additional charge of AIIMS- Bhubaneswar

Executive director of AIIMS-Rae Bareli, Dr Arvind Rajwanshi, has addl charge of AIIMS-Rish

MUMBAI: The Narcotics Control Bureau has suspended two of its officials, who were part of a probe into the cruise drugs case, after a departmental inquiry against them in another case, an NCB official said on Thursday.

Two duo – superintendent Vishwa Vijay Singh and intelligence officer Ashish Ranjan Prasad – had allegedly helped an accused in another drugs case secure bail, he said.

An internal inquiry was conducted against the two officials and after the completion of the probe, they were placed under suspension, the official said.

The action has got nothing to do with the cruise drugs case, he said.

In October last year, a team of the NCB’s Mumbai zone had raided a Goa-bound cruise ship and claimed to have seized drugs onboard.

Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan’s son Aryan Khan and some others are accused in that case.

UNITED NATIONS:  Russia’s war on Ukraine threatens to devastate the economies of many developing countries that are now facing even higher food and energy costs and increasingly difficult financial conditions, a UN task force warned Wednesday.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres released the report saying that the war is “supercharging” a crisis in food, energy and finance in poorer countries that were already struggling to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic, climate change and a lack of access to adequate funding for economic recovery.

“We are now facing a perfect storm that threatens to devastate the economies of many developing countries,” Guterres said at a news conference. “As many as 1.7 billion people — one-third of whom are already living in poverty — are now highly exposed to disruptions in food, energy and finance systems that are triggering increases in poverty and hunger.”

Rebeca Grynspan, secretary-general of the U.N. agency promoting trade and development who coordinated the task force, said those people live in 107 countries that have “severe exposure” to at least one dimension of the crisis — rising food prices, increasing energy prices and tightening financial conditions.

In these countries, the report says, people struggle to afford healthy diets, imports are essential to meet food and energy needs, and “debt burdens and tightening resources limit government’s ability to cope with the vagaries of global financial conditions.”

The report says 69 of the countries, with a population of 1.2 billion people, face a “perfect storm” and are severely or significantly exposed to all three crises. They include 25 countries in Africa, 25 in Asia and the Pacific, and 19 in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, prices were already on the rise, “but the war has made a bad situation worse,” Guterres said.

Thirty-six countries rely on Russia and Ukraine for more than half their wheat imports, including some of the world’s poorest countries, he said, and wheat and corn prices have risen 30% just since the start of the year.

Russia is also the world’s top natural gas exporter and second-largest oil exporter, and Russia and neighboring Belarus export about 20% of the world’s fertilizers. Guterres said oil prices have increased more than 60% over the past year, natural gas prices have jumped 50% in recent months, and fertilizer prices have doubled.

The task force said the world is “on the brink of a global debt crisis.” Grynspan, who heads the U.N. Conference on Trade and Development, pointed to Sri Lanka’s default on a debt payment Tuesday and said other countries are asking for help.

Guterres said the world can act to tackle the “three-dimensional crisis” and “cushion the blow.”

The task force calls on countries to ensure a steady flow of food and fertilizer through open markets, lift export restrictions, and direct surpluses and reserves to those in need. Guterres said this would help keep a lid on food prices and calm volatility in food markets.

On energy, the task force urges governments to refrain from hoarding, immediately release strategic petroleum stockpiles and additional reserves, and reduce the use of wheat for biofuels. Guterres urged countries to use the crisis as an opportunity to accelerate the transition to renewable energy.

On finance, the task force issued “an urgent call for prompt and swift action from the international community” to help developing countries avoid another decade of lost economic development, “a generalized debt crisis, and social and political instability.”

The task force says international financial institutions should provide emergency concessional financing to countries experiencing social and economic distress.

It calls on the International Monetary Fund to increase limits for rapid financial assistance, suspend interest rate surcharges for two years, and explore the possibility of providing more liquidity “through special drawing rights or special measures targeted at the vulnerable and most affected countries.”

Guterres said the upcoming spring meetings of the IMF and the World Bank on April 18-24 are “a crucial moment” for decisions on many of these issues. He said it is crucial that their members understand the need to use money that is available to alleviate the suffering of people around the world.

The UN chief said political will is key, and announced that he has asked six leaders — the presidents of Senegal and Indonesia and the prime ministers of Germany, Barbados, Denmark and Bangladesh — to mobilize political leaders to ensure that developing countries in crisis get the help they need.

BHOPAL:  Women in Zamindar Mohalla locality of communal violence-hit Khargone town of Madhya Pradesh are holding special prayers daily for a 16-year-old boy Shivam Shukla, who is battling for life at an Indore hospital, after being injured in the violence. 

Shivam was about to leave on April 11 for his native Dhar district to attend the marriage of his elder sister Kritika, but the attack by rioters on April 10, resulting in severe brain injuries, ended him up at a private hospital in Indore.

While women are praying for his safety at their homes and nearby temples in the curfew-clamped Khargone, some residents of Khargone, as well as Indore, have collected around  Rs 2 lakh for the treatment.

After being on ventilator support for more than two days, Shivam started showing signs of recovery on Wednesday and is now on external oxygen support.

A native of Nisarpur village in neighbouring Dhar district, Shivam has been living with his maternal uncle’s family in Zamindar Mohalla for the last five years and had taken admission to a diploma course in government polytechnic after completing matriculation last year in Khargone.

With his maternal uncle’s family being the priests of the famous Hinglaj Mata Temple in Khargone town, Shivam along with cousins performed the special Ram Navami arti at the temple and was returning home, when he sustained head injuries in stone-throwing from neighbouring Khaskhas Wadi locality.

“He fell unconscious and was rushed to Khargone district hospital, from where doctors referred him to Indore,” Shivam’s cousin Manthan Joshi said.

According to Indore Divisional Commissioner Dr Pawan Verma, the MP CM has announced that the government will bear the entire expenses for Shivam’s treatment.

Home Minister, Muslim leaders meet

Muslim community leaders led by Bhopal’s Qazi Mushtaq Ali Nadvi met MP Home Minister Narottam Mishra and flayed the “demolition of the properties of one community”.

LUCKNOW:  After drawing a blank in the just-concluded Legislative Council elections in Uttar Pradesh, the Samajwadi Party is facing the likelihood of losing the post of Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the 
Upper House.

On April 28, three SP MLCs — Balwant Singh Ramuwalia, Wasim Barelvi and Madhukar Jaitley — will complete their tenure. This will be followed by the retirement of three more SP MLCs — Rajpal Kashyap, Arvind Kumar and Sanjay Lather — on May 26. Lather is the current Leader of the Opposition.

The Leader of the Opposition is assigned to a member from the largest opposition party in the House, but the party needs to have at least 10 per cent seats of the total strength of the House. On these six seats, the BJP will most likely get its candidates nominated.

On July 6, half a dozen of the 11 remaining SP members will retire.

Those who term ends in July are Jagjeevan Prasad, Kamlesh Kumar Pathak, Ranvijay Singh, Shatrudh Prakash (now in BJP), Balram Yadav and Ran Sunder Das Nishad.

In such a scenario, the SP will be left with just five members — Naresh Uttam Patel, Rajendra Chaudhury, Ashutosh Sinha, Dr Maan Singh Yadav, and Lal Bihari Yadav.

In all, 13 seats of the Assembly quota will be vacated in July and the election to those seats is likely to be held soon. For each seat, votes of 31 MLAs are required.

SP and its allies have 125 members in the Assembly. As per its strength, SP can win maximum four seats and its tally will go up to nine.

Similarly, the BSP, which has four members, will be left with just one seat while the Congress will not be there at all.  

Moreover, three seats which got vacated last year will in all probability be filled by the BJP. Thus, the ruling party is likely to touch the figure of 80 in the Council by July.

WASHINGTON: Russia’s war in Ukraine is likely to result in a significant 1.3 per cent lower GDP growth for India and 2.3 percentage point lower income growth, a top World Bank official has said, even as the lending agency observed that India is emerging strongly from the COVID-19 crisis.

“Our overall assessment is that the war in Ukraine leads to 2.3 percentage point lower income growth for India and 1.3 per cent lower GDP growth. But the adjustment was less than that and that is as I said because of positive surprises we saw in recent data,” he said in response to a question.

The World Bank in its latest South Asia Economic Focus report said that the estimated growth for India in the fiscal year 2021-2022 is 8.3 per cent, which it has forecast to drop to 8 per cent in 2022-2023 and 7.1 per cent in 2023-2024.

“On India, the first observation is that we lowered the forecast for the fiscal year that just started seven tenths of a per cent. That is a combination of the negative impact of the war, but also some positive surprises, especially on the export of digital services which were really strong,” Timmer said.

Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24 and the war is grinding toward its eighth week. The US-led West has imposed crippling sanctions on Moscow over its war against Ukraine. Observing that India is coming from a deep recession at the beginning of the COVID cycle, he said, it is still recovering and not all the damages have been undone.

“But you can see now that growth rates are back to where they were before the pandemic. There’s no strong link between a new variant coming up and GDP growth. But the war in Ukraine is an additional strong headwind. That mainly comes through high commodity prices for India, which is a problem for inflation. It is a problem for the fiscal position as far as they are subsidizing goods,” he said.

Timmer said that even the fact that India is able to buy some cheap oil from Russia at the moment, the big picture is still that they are being hurt by the high commodity prices in the market.

“When we run that through models that leads to a bit more than one percentage point lower GDP growth. But then GDP growth doesn’t tell the whole story, because there’s also terms of trade loss. Even when you produce the same but the prices abroad are higher than with what you produce, you can consume less because everything becomes more expensive for you. That’s what we call a terms of trade loss, which people see in their income, but you don’t see in the GDP numbers that are our production,” Timmer said.

The positive surprises are in the field of digital services. “In recent quarters, India has been very successful in producing the services and exporting them. Internationally, there is a lot of demand for the services at the moment and India can meet that demand that is stronger than what we had initially,” he said.

In response to a question, Timmer suggested that India should expand its “direct income support” programme instead of subsidising food and other essential commodities. “I think that the system that is in place should be used. You should have targeted support measures and that the people can still buy the essentials. That is way better than the other support mechanisms,” he said.

Taking a long-term perspective, Timmer said India is vulnerable because it is reliant on fossil fuels and also because a big part of society is not participating productively in the economy. “And that’s unsustainable in the long run,” he said.

Observing that the female labour force participation is just 20 per cent in India, the lowest of the region, he said that there are lots of opportunities to unleash a lot more potential and not just to rely on formal forms. “And that’s ultimately the best way to protect the poor,” he said.

SRINAGAR:  With Prime Minister Narendra Modi scheduled to visit J&K on April 24 — his first after Article 370 was hollowed out in August 2019 — there is quiet anticipation of bilateral peace overtures from him in the wake of the change of guard in Pakistan.

Bilateral relations when Shehbaz’s predecessor Imran Khan was in the saddle had bottomed as he had burnt his bridges by being a hawk and making personal remarks against Modi.

In contrast, Shehbaz is a seasoned politician. Also, the Pakistan Army is inclined towards the resumption of dialogue with India.

The exchange of messages between Modi and Shehbaz has sent positive vibes in J&K. Jammu-based political commentator Rekha Choudhary said Modi may send some positive signals to Pakistan during his address at a public rally in Samba, close to the International Border in J&K.

“He may talk of peace between the two neighboring countries and Pakistan taking up the responsibility that its soil is not used for terror. But there will be no accusations,” she said.

For over a year, Indian and Pakistani troops have strictly adhered to the November 2003 border ceasefire pact. The Line of Control and International Border in J&K have been calm since February 25 last year.

Modi would be visiting the Palli panchayat in the Samba district of Jammu to mark the National Panchayati Raj Diwas celebrations. From there, he will address representatives of around 700 panchayats across the country virtually. About 30,000 representatives of the Panchayati Raj Institutions of J&K are expected to attend the event.

The PM’s public rally would be his third so far in Samba. Thousands of people from different parts of the Jammu region are expected to attend the rally.  At an all-party meeting of J&K leaders last year, Modi had famously said he wanted to remove the Dilli ki doori (distance from Delhi) and dil ki doori (distance from the heart).

Meanwhile, a senior army officer on Wednesday said that the change of guard in Pakistan is an “internal matter” of that country, asserting that the Indian troops are in full control to ensure no infiltration takes place.

Talking to reporters on the sidelines of a function in Rajouri district, General Officer Commanding (GOC) of army’s Jammu-based 16 Corps, also known as White Knight Corps, Lt General Manjinder Singh also said that the army is fully prepared to tackle any type of situation along the Line of Control (LoC) as Pakistan is continuously making attempts to disturb peace in Jammu and Kashmir.

“Change of guard in Pakistan is its internal matter, while the situation along the LoC is a different thing,” he said, while responding to a question on the recent change of guard in Pakistan where Shahbaz Shareef has replaced Imran Khan, who was removed from office through a no-confidence vote, as new prime minister.

“I would not like to comment what is happening inside Pakistan but as far as the LoC is concerned, it is our duty to guard it and the army is fully in control to ensure that no infiltration takes place,” the GOC said.

Asserting that there are no inputs suggesting presence of a large number of terrorists on launching pads across the LoC, the army officer said that the dropping of weapons by drones from Pakistan is more a threat along the International Border (IB) rather than LoC and the Border Security Force (BSF) is effectively tackling the challenge.

“They (Pakistan) will attempt (to push terrorists into this side taking advantage of melting of snow) by activating the launch pads as Pakistan is continuously making attempts to disturb peace (in Jammu and Kashmir),” Lt General Singh said, replying to a query about the possibility of increased infiltration attempts from Pakistan with the melting of snow along the possible infiltration routes.

“We are keeping a watch on the situation and our counter-infiltration measures are in place to foil all their attempts,” the army officer said.

Asked about intelligence inputs suggesting increasing activity of terrorists on the launch pads across the LoC, he said, “There is no alarming situation that a lot of people had gathered on the launch pads.”

“The number of terrorists on launch pads is an assessment and nobody has seen them physically. There are many agencies and inputs do come, but there is variation in these inputs. We do not have any input like a lot of them had gathered on the launch pads,” he said, adding “if the numbers are compared with last year’s, there are minor variations.”

On the threat posed by the use of drones by Pakistan to drop weapons on this side, he said such activities are mostly taking place along the IB being guarded by the BSF.

“No major action of drones was noticed along the LoC till date. As far as IB is concerned, the BSF is alive to the challenge and are tackling it effectively,” he said.

Asked about his assessment of the challenge being posed by Pakistan and China, the GOC said the major challenge for his troops is definitely Pakistan as White Knight Corps does not share borders with China.

On recent incidents of terror attacks in Rajouri, he said “whenever there is peace and development, the enemy is not happy and makes an attempt to disturb it.”

“Such type of sporadic incidents (are happening) to give anyone a grenade and he hurls it is the work of a coward. It did not need a lot of courage, so such type of work can be done by our enemy alone,” he said.

However, he said the army and the people are together and “I am sure that our enemy will not be able to break our strength and we will emerge as successful. Some of our friends who are misled by any reason will join us as well and the enemy will fail in its design.”

He lauded the people for enthusiastically participating in the ‘Rajouri Day’ celebrations and said “we all have joined hands and will move together for peace and development of this region.”

“Rajouri is a beautiful valley having a lot of tourism potential. We are making attempts to bring the Rajouri festival on the national calendar,” he said.