bhubaneswar l wednesday l november 23, 2022 l `9.00 l PAGES 12 l jeypore EDITION Air India beats all others, becomes most punctual The Tata group-owned airline clocked an impressive 90.8% on-time performance in October, the best among all carriers Indigo’s on-time performance slips Go First at bottom of the chart This is a notable achievement for Air India given that it was usually at the bottom of the chart when it was a run by the government. In October, Vistara and AirAsia India claimed the second spot with on-time performance score of 89.1% each, followed by IndiGo (87.5%). IndiGo was the most punctual airline in February (95.4%) and March (93.9%) ■ The monthly data released by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation on Tuesday also showed that SpiceJet’s punctuality rate stood at 68.9% in October, while Go FIRST ended up at the last spot with on-time performance tag at 60.7%. The data is based on punctuality at Bengaluru, Delhi, Hyderabad & Mumbai 1.14 crore Number of passengers flown by Indian carriers on domestic routes in October 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 Mukesh passes RIL mantle to Anant, Dhanraj Odisha govt readies Rly Younger son already handling matters related to govt, politics & legal; Nathwani scion to manage corporate affairs Sh a h i d F a r i d i @ New Delhi Prime Minister Narendra Modi received a young visitor at his 7, Lok Kalyan Marg residence late evening in the middle of October. The meeting signalled a big change at the top level of India’s largest private sector corporation — Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL). The man who drove into the Prime Minister’s residence in a black Mercedes was Anant Ambani, the younger son of India’s second richest man Mukesh Ambani. Sources said RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani has handed over the job of handling matters relating to government, politics and legal affairs to Anant. The young Ambani has been travelling to states to meet chief ministers. He is said to have developed a good rapport with several chief ministers, including prominent ones from the BJPruled states, with whom he is maintaining close contact. His one-and-half-hour meeting with the prime minister was focused on the impending change of guard at Maker Chamber in Mumbai, RIL’s headquarters, it is reliably learnt. The 27-year-old Anant will handle the legacy business of oil, while his older siblings Akash and Isha will focus on the Dhanraj Nathwani Anant Ambani group’s new ventures — digital, including telecom, and retail. Akash, along with sister Isha, will also look after marketing and brand building. Anant was inducted into the board of RIL’s clean energy companies last year. Sources said the Reliance group’s key troubleshooter and Rajya Sabha member, Parimal Messi Argentina lose way in Arabian desert S i d d h a n t h A n e y @ Doha CRAZY things can happen in sport. A resolute, brave and technically sound Saudi Arabia put Asia on the board at the 2022 FIFA men’s World Cup in Qatar on Tuesday In the process, they . scripted one one of the biggest upsets in the history of the sport. The thousands of Saudi fans who made the trip across the border would be lying if they said a final scoreline of 2-1 against Argentina was a result they expected anywhere other than in their wildest fantasies. Yet, that’s how it ended at a roaring Lusail Stadium that was draped in a sea of green. It was reminiscent of Argentina’s 0-1 loss to Cameroon in Italy 1990, where they were defending champions. A remarkably composed Herve Renard, Saudi coach, summed it up in the postmatch press conference. “Argentina are a fantastic team with great players,” he said. “They were unbeaten in 36 games and Six shot dead on AssamMeghalaya border P r a s a n ta M a z u m d a r @ Guwahati Five civilians and a forest guard were killed and several others injured in an incident of firing on the Assam-Meghalaya border early morning on Tuesday . The firing took place between “Assam forest officials and unknown miscreants” at Mukhrow under Jirikinding police station in the state’s West Karbi Anglong district, the Assam government said. It happened when the forest party attempted to stop a truck smuggling out illegal timber. “When the truck was stopped by the forest party personnel, they were gheraoed by unknown miscreants who resorted to violence. In order to save their lives, the forest party resorted to firing,” the Assam government’s statement said. Later in the day, the Assam government decided to hand over the probe to a central/neutral investigation agency and also institut. ed a judicial inquiry Besides, . it transferred West Karbi Anglong SP Imdad Ali and suspended officer-in-charge of Jirikinding police station Kajal Nath and forest protection officer Shikari Enghi. Both Assam and Meghalaya governments also separately announced `5 lakh each as ex gratia to the next of kin of the victims. Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma strongly condemned the incident. He said the Assam Police and its forest guards entered Meghalaya and resorted to unprovoked firing. the champions of South America. But this is football. Sometimes crazy things happen.” It could have gone very differently. With the clock barely at the double digit mark, Lionel Messi, in his last World Cup, stepped up to the penalty spot and calmly stroked the ball home. From then on, it was hard work for the Saudis. Argentina dominated possession and had all the chances. In the next 20 minutes, they found the back of the net thrice, first it was Messi who latched on to a lofted through ball and finished with characteristic composure. Then the in-form Lautaro Martinez did the same, twice. Each time FIFA’s new semi-automated offside technology came to Saudi’s rescue. Playing a high line and, despite all the attempts by Argentina, Saudi’s offside trap held. Seven times in the first half, the linesman held his flag up. Still, going into the break a goal up and under little or no pressure, it seemed only a mat- ter of time before Lionel Scaloni’s side cemented the lead. The Green Falcons, cheered on by fans, produced a stunning 10-minute spell to flip the game on its head. Playing on the counter, Saleh Al-Shehri converted superbly off a low-percentage chance off his left foot, levelling things up three minutes after half-time. Then Salem AlDawsari produced a magical solo goal. The two-time champions had opportunities to level but Saudi resisted to script a famous win.  Continued on P11 Nathwani, will also hand over the baton to his son, Dhanraj Nathwani, who will henceforth handle corporate affairs in the national capital. Dhanraj has so far been handling RIL’s affairs in Gujarat. He is now being given a new office in Delhi. Dhanraj is married to the daughter of Ahmedabad-based businessman Rajesh Khandwala. Khandwala has had financial links with Jay Shah, son of Union home minister Amit Shah. Dhanraj was last week elected as the president of Gujarat Cricket Association, a post earlier held by Narendra Modi and Amit Shah. Dhanraj also played a key role in the construction of the Narendra Modi Cricket Stadium in Ahmedabad. Sources said Anant and Dhanraj will henceforth handle government affairs in Delhi. The old Reliance hand, V Balasubramanian, a.k.a Balu, and Parimal Nathwani will continue to mentor the two young leaders in government affairs for some time. According to sources, the group plans to aggressively promote the Jio brand and ultimately phase out the Reliance name. The group’s founder Dhirubhai Ambani had picked Reliance as the brand name to send out a message to his investors and supporters that they could rely on him. What undid the albiceleste? Saudi Arabia’s energy and high-intensity caught Argentina unawares. The Saudi primary league has been shut since October third week, so players have been in sync with each other, training together and playing friendly matches for the last two months. That level of understanding showed in a display full of heart and effort from the first to the final whistle Saudi Arabia declared Wednesday as public holiday It's a very heavy blow, a defeat that hurts, but we must continue to have confidence in ourselves. This group is not going to give up. We will try to beat Mexico — Lionel Messi Today’s matches Morocco vs Croatia 3.30 PM Germany vs Japan 6.30 PM Spain vs Costa Rica 9.30 PM Belgium vs Canada 12.30 AM on Thursday proposals worth `8.4K cr for Union budget 23-24 Hemant Kumar Rout @ Bhubaneswar AMID the political slugfest over new railway lines and divisions ahead of Padampur bypoll, the state government is learnt to have readied proposals of around `8,400 crore for improvement of railway infrastructure in Odisha which will be sent to the Centre for making provisions in 2023-24 budget. The proposals include ongoing projects, sanctioning of new lines, station modernisation, introduction of new trains, extension of existing trains, improved passenger amenities at stations and on-board services. The state government has prepared a proposal seeking provision of `100 crore in the railway budget for the 142 km Nuapada Road- Bargarh Road via Padampur line that has heated up the political climate in the bypoll-bound Padampur with the Centre and state throwing mud at each other over delay in execution of the project. The much-awaited 289 km Khurda Road-Balangir broad gauge rail link project has assumed prominence with a demand of `1,200 crore, followed by `800 for 154 km Talcher-Bim- lagarh, `300 crore for extension of Nuapada-Gunupur new broad gauge rail link up to Theruvalli (79 km), `300 crore for 130 km Jeypore-Malkangiri new line, `200 crore for 250 km GopalpurRairakhol new line and `150 crore for 38 km NabarangpurJeypore new line. An official said, Odisha generates annual freight revenue of about `20,000 crore for Indian Railways. But the rail density in the state at 18 is much lower as compared to the national average of 21 and that of the neighbouring states of West Bengal (48) and Jharkhand (33). “The state government has already partnered with Indian Railways to fill the viability gap and formed joint ventures/special purpose vehicles (SPVs) to expedite augmentation of rail infrastructure by directly financing construction besides offering free land. The proposals will be sent to the ministry after approval of the government,” he added. The proposed projects worth `8,400 crore is around 10.5 per cent higher than the demand of the state for railway infrastructure last year. The government had demanded provision of at least `7,600 crore in the 2022-23 Union budget.