tirupati l wednesday l march 03, 2021 l `7.00 l PAGES 12 l late city EDITION ‘indo-pak express’ to come together at acapulco Despite tension between India and Pakistan, Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi and Rohan Bopanna join hands for first time since 2014 Only one event to start with The pair, nicknamed ‘Indo-Pak Express’, will be teaming up at the ATP 500 meet in Mexico, slated to be held from March 15-21. “For the time being, we will only be playing in Acapulco,” Aisam said. “Let’s see how it goes.” With invaluable ranking points up for grabs, it’s a big meet for P11 Bopanna, who is yet to win a match this year (three losses).  ■ FIVE ‘stop war, start tennis’ ■ They were praised after they wore T-shirts that had the above slogan in order to promote peace between the two countries. They won the 'Arthur Ashe Humanitarian of The Year' award The pair decided to come together as a team after spending time together in Melbourne in February during the Australian Open The pair has previously won five titles on the atp tour CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOgGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ WARANGAL ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI CM hardsells AP port projects to tap Blue Economy E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ Vijayawada Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy on Tuesday said the State government has taken several steps to attract large investments in manufacturing, petrochemicals, food processing, pharmaceuticals and other sectors to ensure that the ports in Andhra Pradesh operate at their full capacity . Jagan, who attended the Maritime India Summit 2021 inaugurated virtually by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, said his government has designed well- calibrated interventions to promote port-based industries and develop new economic cities driven by the ports all along the coastline of the State. He also invited representatives of various companies from India and abroad, who attended the summit, to invest in AP and assured them the best environment for their operations and full support from his government. Jagan pointed out that 95 per cent of India’s trading by volume and 70 per cent by value is through maritime transport. “Indian ports handled approximately 1.2 billion metric tonnes of AP aims to achieve 10% share of exports by 2030 CM Jagan Mohan Reddy said AP ports handle more than 170 million tonnes of cargo per annum. “AP shares 4 per cent of total Indian exports and we aim to reach 10 per cent share by 2030,’’ he said. cargo in 2019–20 and much required policy reforms like 100 per cent FDI, Make in India, Sagarmala and Bharatmala have been introduced to ensure exponential growth in this sector. Stating that the importance of ‘Blue Economy’ in a nation’s growth story extends much beyond the maritime trade and the export - import statistics, Jagan said the true value of it is unlocked only when all the allied sectors, which are directly and indirectly dependent on the ocean, such as aquaculture, maritime and coastal tourism, chemical and bio-technological explo- ration, shipbuilding and other port led industries mature enough to provide sustainable employment and growth opportunities. “The draft of the first ever National Fishing Policy released by the Centre in September 2020 is an example of several such solid steps taken in that direction,’’ he said. Jagan said drawing inspiration from the PM’s focused agenda to take India’s maritime economy to the next level, the State government has initiated a lot of transformative steps to leverage its coastline of 974 km, which is the second longest in India.  P4 Debt crisis staring India in the face, warns former PM virus spread Daily Covid-19 count exceeds 100, sample testing raised to 35K E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ Vijayawada Could affect small and medium scale sectors; says temporary steps can’t paper over issue be revived provided schemes for the poor and the downtrodden FORMER prime minister Man- are implemented,” he opined. mohan Singh on Tuesday Regarding Kerala, he said warned of a looming debt crisis, even though its social standards saying temporary steps taken by are high, due diligence should the Centre and the Reserve Bank be given to certain other sectors of India cannot paper over the that require periodic review. he credit problems staring the pointed out that the state is faccountry in the face. ing several hurdles that have to Blaming the BJP be overcome at a time government’s ‘ill-conwhen the global ecoceived’ demonetisation nomic slowdown over for the country’s high the last two to three unemployment rate, years has skyrocketed Manmohan Singh due to the pandemic. warned that the crisis “The proliferation of could adversely affect digital use would give the small and medium an impetus to informasectors of the industry . tion technology, but it He was speaking after will still hamper the inaugurating a develprospects of the touropment summit, orism sector. The more Unemployment is ganised virtually by the pandemic is creathigh and the the Rajiv Gandhi Instiing havoc, the chalinformal sector is in tute of Development lenges faced in the shambles, a crisis Studies at Neyyar Dam precipitated by the tourism sector are in Thiruvananmore. The public fundill-considered thapuram on Tuesday . ing is in a shambles in demonetisation “Due to the ill-conKe r a l a a n d o t h e r Manmohan Singh ceived demonetisation states, which has led in 2016, unemployment them to seek loans. skyrocketed and the unorgan- This will create further issues in ised sector landed in a shambles. future budgets,” added Singh. If India’s political and economic Expressing happiness at the philosophy stood for a founda- UDF’s “people’s manifesto”, tion as envisaged in the coun- which has promised the NYAY try’s Constitution, having a fed- scheme that aims to provide eral set-up and communication `6,000 per month to the poor between the states, the incum- households, Singh hoped it bent Union gover nment is would usher in revolutionary against this. The economy can changes in the society . E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ T’Puram express read Landslide win for BJP in Gujarat civic body polls Ahmedabad: The BJP won all 31 district panchayats, 70 out of 81 municipalities and was far ahead of main rival Congress in 231 taluka panchayats as counting for the second phase of local body polls in Gujarat was underway on Tuesday. Shortly after the results, Congress state unit chief Amit Chavda resigned from his post. The success follows the BJP’s clean sweep in six municipal corporations last month Tandav row: Amazon Prime issues apology New Delhi: Amazon Prime Video on Tuesday said it respects its viewers ‘diverse beliefs’ and apologises unconditionally to anyone who felt hurt by scenes in Tandav, a webseries that landed in trouble over allegations of depicting Hindu gods in an objectionable manner. Tandav premiered on January 15. In a statement, the streamer said it ‘deeply regrets’ the fact that viewers considered certain scenes to be objectionable. poll brew Priyanka Gandhi Vadra tries her hand at plucking tea leaves at the Sadhuru tea garden in Biswanath, Assam, on Tuesday | twitter More Jammu-like G23 meets lined up, Congress wary of taking action R i c h a S h a r m a @ New Delhi The group of 23 (G23) dissenters in the Congress is planning to raise their pitch against the high command by organising a series of meetings in other states on the lines of the one they held in Jammu recently . With four states and a Union Territory set to face Assembly elections soon, the party leadership is treading cautiously even as the G23 seeks to fan out in Haryana, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh in the coming weeks. “These meetings will be held before the party’s presidential election, which is scheduled by May-end. Anand Sharma has been asked to arrange one meeting in Himachal Pradesh, Bhupinder Singh Hooda in Ku- Molestation victim’s father shot dead in U.P. E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ Lucknow The henchmen of an alleged molester who is out on bail since 2018 in UP’s lawless Hathras, shot dead the victim’s father in his potato farm as he refused to withdraw the case, triggering outrage across the nation. A day after the incident, the police on Tuesday arrested two of the four assailants even as Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath ordered that the National Security Act (NSA) be slapped on them. A c c o rd i n g t o s o u rc e s, Amrish Sharma, a resident of Nauzarpur in Hathras, had registered a complaint against Gaurav Sharma in July 2018 for allegedly molesting his daughter. Gaurav had been pressing Sharma to withdraw the case after coming out on bail in 2018. Hathras Superintendent of Police (SP) Vineet Jaiswal said on Monday the wife and the aunt of Gaurav picked up a heated argument with the daughters of Sharma at a temple in the village. “The accused and Sharma, too, arrived at the spot and joined the issue,” the SP said. Later, around 3.30 pm, Sharma was at his potato field when Gaurav and his three accomplices shot at him in front of his wife and daughter. Sharma sustained injuries to his head, chest and abdomen, and died on the spot. The SP said special teams were on the lookout for the other two suspects. Sharma is associated with the Samajwadi Party and was planning to organise a Kisan Mahapanchayat in Tappal, in which the party chief Akhilesh Yadav is slated to participate on Wednesday . rukshetra and Manish Tewari in Ropar or Anandpur Sahib,” said sources, adding that Hooda’s event may spell trouble for the party as he enjoys mass support in Haryana. The party leadership is wary of taking any precipitate action against the rebels ahead of the crucial election. “The build up by these leaders will fizzle out soon. Taking any disciplinary action at this moment (ahead of Assembly elections) will send a wrong signal to people and draw unnecessary attention. If the party does well in the Assembly election under the leadership of Rahul Gandhi, it will automatically subdue the momentum these leaders are trying to build up before the presidential election,” said a party leader. At the Jammu meeting, the dissenters had said that the Congress was getting weaker and they were working to strengthen it. The party has refrained from making any harsh comments and instead urged them to work for strengthening the Congress ahead of the Assembly elections. As it is, the G23 has already weakened as some members are unhappy over a few of them articulating their misgivings in public. Ghulam Nabi Azad’s praise of Modi and Anand Sharma’s critique of the Left-Congress alliance in Bengal coopting the new Indian Secular Front floated by Abbas Siddique are the latest flash points. Govt to mop up `20K cr this fiscal from spectrum sale India’s first spectrum auctions in five years ended on Tuesday with the government selling `77,815 crore worth of airwaves and Reliance Jio walking away with the lion’s share of winning bids worth `57,122 crore. The expensive 700 MHz and 2,500 MHz band did not attract any buyers 20 Per cent of spectrum put up for auction sold Assets on offer Quantum: 2,308.8 MHz Reserve Price `3.92 lakh crore Spectrum sold Quantum: 855.6 MHz Total bids `77,815 crore For the third time in the last four days, the daily Covid-19 count crossed the 100-mark in the State. In all, 106 new cases were reported in the past 24 hours ending Tuesday 9 am, taking the overall count to more than 8.9 lakh. The total number of samples tested in the State has surged past 1.4 crore, while the total recoveries stood at 8.82 lakh. The State has been witnessing a spike in daily Covid count for the past one week. On February 22, the State reported 41 new cases and the number of active cases stood at 590. In the next eight days, 645 new cases added to the overall count. Of the total, Chittoor district has accounted for more than 175 cases. Prakasam and Vizianagaram districts witnessed the lowest spike in cases. With the rise in daily count, the Medical and Health Department has ramped up sample testing. The number of samples tested per day, which came down to 15,000, has been increased to 35,000. According to the media bulletin released by the State Command Control Room, Chittoor recorded the highest number of 33 new cases. Anantapur and East Godavari were the other two districts with the double digit daily count. Prakasam and Vizianagaram reported no new cases, while Kurnool and Nellore recorded three cases each. No new Covid death was reported. The number of new recoveries came down to 57. With the decline in new recoveries, the number of active cases increased to 774. When the daily count was less than 50 for a few weeks, the number of active cases slumped to below 500. The spike in the daily count resulted in rise in case load. farmers Campaign Against bjp in polls Samyukt Kisan Morcha, which is leading the anti-farm law protests, will send its leaders to poll-bound states to appeal to farmers to defeat the BJP in elections Company-wise breakup Reliance Jio Bharti Airtel Vodafone Idea Quantum 488.35 MHz Total amount Quantum 355.45 MHz Total amount Quantum 11.8 MHz Total amount `57,122.65 cr `18,698.75 cr `1,993.4 cr `19,000-20,000 cr to be received by the government from spectrum auctions during the current fiscal year, with the rest to be paid later After 5 decades of service, the poor’s doc no more S T r i m u r t h u l u @ Kakinada Dr Bhupathi Nageswara Rao of Pasarlapudi, popularly known as ‘Pedala Doctor’ in Amalapuram division, died of a cardiac arrest on Monday night. He was 82. He rendered yeoman service by treating poor people of Amalapuram for almost five decades. He used to charge just `10 from a patient. Even if the patient could not afford to pay the fee, it did not matter for him. Even if he faced financial stringency he did not , increase his consultation fee to get additional income. For that matter, he did not upgrade his clinic into a hospital sensing that patients might not come to him thinking that they would have to pay more fee. After finishing MBBS, Dr Rao joined government service. But he quit the job as he felt he could not serve the poor people in far off villages as a government doctor. He started his own clinic in a rented house. Dr Rao married Lalitha Kumari and the couple got three children. “Dr Rao used to be available to patients 24x7. He never showed reluctance to visit the patient’s house located in remote places,” said Pradeep, a resident of Pasarlapudi. “He never hesitated to refer the case to a specialist doctor if there was no improvement in the condition of patient despite his treatment,” said Bonam Babjee, another villager. ‘Pedala Doctor’ is a household name in several villages for his ‘healing touch’. His demise came as a shock to people of several villages.