KOZHIKODE l friday l april 29, 2022 l `9.00 l PAGES 12 l city EDITION China blocks return of 22,000 Indian students However, Beijing has allowed students from countries like Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Thailand to come back to China Practicals pending for medical students beijing yet to give a firm response Thousands of Indian students have enrolled in Chinese universities, mostly to study medicine. They came back to India two years ago when the pandemic started. The students have been attending classes online but it’s time for many of them to do practicals. For this, they have to travel to China for in-person classes. But, Beijing is not letting them come back | P7 ■ ■ Union Health Minister Dr Mansukh Mandaviya has written to Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla to help facilitate the return of Indian students to China to complete their study The Indian government is in touch with China, which has neither given a firm response nor has issued visas to Indian students CHINA Is preferred by Indian MED students as admission is easy and fees ARE cheap CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOgGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI Efforts on to lift AFSPA in toto: Modi P r a s a n ta M a z u m d a r @ Guwahati E X P RE S S REA D Biden-Modi meet during Quad summit on May 24 Washington: Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden will meet during the Quad summit in Tokyo on May 24, the White House said. The leaders are expected to discuss a range of topics including the challengs China poses to the region. P7 Kerala beat K’taka, in Santosh Trophy final Malappuram: Kerala entered the final of the Santosh Trophy National Football Championship at the Sports Council Stadium at Payyanad in Manjeri on Thursday. In the semifinal, the hosts defeated Karnataka 7-3. The final will be played on Monday. P11 Veteran actor Salim Ghouse dies at 70 Mumbai: Veteran actor Salim Ghouse, who brilliantly portrayed the role of Raghavan in Thazhvaram, died on Thursday morning following a cardiac arrest. He was 70. P5 Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said efforts were on to withdraw the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) from the remaining areas of the Northeast. Addressing a “Peace, Unity and Development Rally” in Assam’s Karbi Anglong, he said old rules were being tweaked as peace was making a steady return to the Northeast as a result of the collective efforts of the state governments and the people. “AFSPA remained enforced in many states of the Northeast for a long time but after the return of Hospitals exempted E xpress N ews S ervice @ T’Puram THE state government and KRail should find alternatives to SilverLine and explore the possibility of laying third and fourth lines parallel to the existing railway tracks in the state, noted environmentalist R V G Menon said on Thursday . He was speaking at a debate organised by K-Rail on the Left government’s ambitious semi high-speed rail project in the state capital. The three other panelists, who spoke in favour of the project, insisted it would boost the state’s economic activity and reduce accidents. They agreed on the lapses that need to Centre collects C26.50 as cess out of the total C27.90 tax on petrol per litre. It means only C1.4 is shared with states. As for diesel, only C1.80 is shared out of the total tax of C21.80 Currently there are 626 curves in the existing railway line. High-speed trains cannot run on such a track. We should explore the possibility of third and fourth lines and modify the signalling system R V G Menon E X P R E S S N E W S S E R V I C E @ Kochi According to the 15th Finance Commission report, Centre has to share 41% of the divisible pool of taxes. However, divisible pool does not include cess Over five years till FY21, the Centre’s fuel tax went up by 54%, while that of states grew just 15%. Of the total C6.37 lakh crore tax collected in FY21, Centre pocketed 66% C o m p o n e n ts o f c e n t r a l e x c i s e Cesses Basic Agri infra & Additional excise Excise Duty Special additional excise development cess duty (road and (C/ltr) duty (C/ltr) (AIDC) (C/ltr) infra cess) (C/ltr) 1.40 11 2.50 13 1.80 8 4 8 Petrol Diesel be addressed. Former Railway Board member Subodh Jain went on to say that, going by the current assessment, there will be a minimum 20% cost escalation to the `64,000-crore project. Menon pointed out certain issues related to existing lines. “Currently there are 626 curves in the existing railway line. High-speed trains cannot run on such a track. We should explore the possibility of third and fourth lines and modify the signalling system. Taking over the land adjacent to the one owned by railway will be easier, as people will be willing to give consent and the cost too will be less,” said Menon.  ● More on P4 Lookout notice for Vijay Babu, police may alert Interpol A big part of the fuel taxes the Centre collects needs to be shared with states, right? But the mop-up workaround is through cess, which is not shared and forms the bulk of the central taxes. Here’s how: Fuel that AFSPA can be removed.” Modi highlighted how the Centre’s efforts had helped solve the problem of insurgency in Assam’s Bodo areas, Karbi Anglong and in Tripura and the Bru (Reang) problem of Tripura-Mizoram. He expressed happiness that Assam and Meghalaya reached an agreement to resolve their boundary disputes. This will give impetus to the development aspirations of the region, he added. Later in the day he inaugurat, ed seven cancer hospitals and laid the foundation of as many others across the state, virtually from Dibrugarh. Three more cancer hospitals are expected to be operational by the year-end. In all, 17 advanced cancer hospitals would be ready in Assam by the time it celebrates the third anniversary of the BJP-led coalition government in May 2024. These hospitals have been/are being built with funds from Tata Trusts and the state government. Tata Trusts chairman Ratan Tata said, “Today is a ... day that raises Assam to a higher level in terms of health care and treatment of cancer that has not been experienced by the other states in the country .” Menon wants lines parallel to 15-min power cut in state during peak hrs rly tracks, bents straightened THE FUEL CESS-POOL 1 2 3 permanent peace and also due to better administration in the past eight years, we removed it from many areas,” the PM said. He added that incidents of violence in the Northeast had dropped by around 75%. This is why AFSPA was first removed from Tripura and then Meghalaya. AFSPA had been invoked in Assam for three decades but with the improvement in the overall security situation in the past few years, it was removed from 23 districts. “We are trying to normalise the situation in other areas as well so 56.55 27.9 3.86 32.19 120.5 56.55 27.9 3.86 17.13 105.45 56.55 27.9 3.86 22.76 111.07 56.55 27.9 3.86 22.52 110.83 Break-up of retail petrol prices in metros (Figues in B) Mumbai Delhi Bengaluru Chennai ■ Price to dealers (excluding excise duty & VAT) (C/litre) ■ Central taxes: Excise duty C/ litre ■ Dealer commission (average) C/litre ■ State taxes: VAT (including VAT on dealer commission) applicable for Delhi @ 19.4% C/litre ■ Retail selling price (rounded off) C/litre Source: Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell and HPCL HAVING collected evidence, the police on Thursday issued a lookout notice for film producer Vijay Babu, who faces rape and sexual assault charges raised by a young actor. The police said the evidence concur prima facie with the allegations, and they want to impound his passport if he has not left the country and alert the Interpol if he is abroad. Following unconfirmed reports that Vijay Babu is holed up somewhere in Dubai, the police have already contacted the Bureau of Emigration. They had registered separate cases for sexual assault and for revealing the survivor’s name during a Facebook Live Tuesday midnight. Kochi City Police Commissioner Nagaraju Chakilam told TNIE that they have collected evidence from Vijay Babu’s flat at Panampilly Nagar and from the hotel rooms where the crime was committed, as alleged by the survivor. The lookout notice is considered to be a strategic move by the police to mount pressure on Vijay Babu to surrender within the time specified in a ● More on P4 summons issued to him.  rare BSF gesture Groom soldier gets an airlift from snow-bound LoC post F aya z W a ni @ Srinagar Evacuating soldiers and civilians by air from remote locations happens all the time during exigencies. The thumb rule till now has been to fly them out if they require immediate medical attention. For the first time in the Border Security Force’s history, it added another factor to the exigency list — marriage. It allowed airlifting a jawan from his post along the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir so as to help him reach home in Odisha time for his wedding on Monday . BSF constable Narayana Behera (30), a resident of Adipur village of Dhenkanal district of Odisha, is posted at Machil sector along the LoC in north Kashmir. He is scheduled to get married on May 2. But since snowbound Machil’s road link to Srinagar is not open yet, he put in a request for airlifting as a special case. His unit commanders escalated the matter to BSF Inspector General (Kashmir frontier) Raja Babu Singh. Sensing the urgency and showing deep empat hy, I G S i n g h g r a n t e d permission. He later said he approved the air sortie because the welf are of SOURAV ROY troops was his “first and foremost priority .” In view of the weather conditions, it was decided to airlift the jawan on Thursday He was flown out in a Chee. tah helicopter from the LoC to Srinagar in the morning, an officer said. After reaching Srinagar, Behera boarded a Delhibound plane from where he took a connecting flight to Bhubaneswar. Behera was understandably relieved upon arriving in Srinagar. Cities, hospitals and essential services have been exempted from the power cut on Thursday and Friday from 6.30pm to 11.30pm 14 states are facing power cuts currently E xpress N ews S ervice @ T’Puram THE KSEBL on Thursday enforced a 15-minute power cut during peak hours for two days in Kerala after the nationwide coal crisis hit the availability of electricity from the central pool. Cities, hospitals and essential services have been exempted from the power cut on Thursday and Friday from 6.30pm to 11.30pm, KSEBL said. The demand for power has gone up due to sweltering summer heat at a time when thermal power generation in the country has come down in the wake of the coal crisis, the board said. There is a shortage of 10.7GW of power in the country and the state faced a deficiency of 400MW to 500MW per day The KSE. BL urged consumers to help bring down consumption. KSEBL said it has drawn up plans to resolve the crisis within two days by procuring 200MW of power from Andhra Pradesh and making operational the Nallalam diesel power plant in Kozhikode. Power Minister K Krishnankutty said the state needs 4,580MW during peak hours daily “Maithon Power . Station, Jharkhand has informed there would be a shortage of 135MW in its sup● More on P4 ply  . The board expects a 400MW-500MW deficiency during the peak hours and hence has enforced power restriction in the state — K Krishnankutty, Power Minister