tirupati l sunday l january 22, 2023 l `12.00 l PAGES 24 l late city EDITION dollar-less Pak’s foreign trade by sea in jeopardy Shipping lines threaten to stop services as Pakistan fails to pay freight charges due to US dollar crunch Shipping agents seek govt intervention petroleum stocks may dry up Ship agents warned that any further payment delays will constrain Pakistan’s external trade. Pakistan Ship’s Agents Association (PSAA) chairman Abdul Rauf wrote to Finance Minister Ishaq Dar seeking urgent government intervention, warning that if intern-ational trade comes to a halt, Pakistan’s already bad economic situation will worsen ■ It comes as thousands of shipping containers are being held up at Karachi port because of lack of payment guarantees ■ The Petroleum Division warned the central bank that the stocks of petroleum products may dry up as banks are refusing to open and confirm Letters of Credit for imports $5 billion is the annual freight bill of Pakistan 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 Ministry cancels all WFI events after embattled chief opens meet in his home turf N a m i ta B a j pa i / F i r o z M i r z a @ Lucknow/Chennai A day after wrestlers called off their protest at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi, the Senior National Open Ranking Tournament began in Gonda (Uttar Pradesh), the home turf of embattled Wrestling Federation of India chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, on Saturday . After serious allegations, including that of sexual harassment were levelled against him by the agitating wrestlers, Singh had been asked to step aside from the day-to-day functioning of the federation late on Friday. However, the WFI chief not only inaugurated the three-day tournament as a chief guest, but also witnessed the day’s action from close YT, Twitter axe BBC series after govt fiat Pa r v e z S u lta n @ New Delhi WITH THIS ISSUE The Uncommon Flu PLUS 12 PAGES Twin blasts in Jammu ahead of Rahul’s yatra Faya z wa n i @ Srinagar AT least nine persons were injured, one of them critically in , twin blasts in the outskirts of Jammu, the winter capital of J&K, where security has been tightened for Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra and Republic Day. The Yatra is set to arrive in Jammu on Monday . “Around 11 am, a blast took place in a Bolero vehicle. Soon after, security personnel rushed to the area and launched an operation. Just as they went about their job, another blast took place, near the first site,” said ADG Mukesh Singh. The injured have been shifted to the Government Medical College Hospital in Jammu. Condition of one of them is critical. “Such dastardly acts highlight the desperation and cowardice of those responsible. No efforts should be spared to bring the perpetrators to justice,” Lt Governor Manoj Sinha said. The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has issued directions to block multiple YouTube videos and Twitter posts that shared links to the first part of a BBC documentary India: The Modi , Question, on the 2002 Gujarat riots. Twitter was ordered to block over 50 tweets containing links of those YouTube videos, officials said. The directions came from the Secretary, I&B ministry on Friday who invoked emergency pow, ers under the IT Rules, 2021. “Both YouTube and Twitter have complied with the directions,” sources added. The ministry of external affairs had a couple of days ago had trashed the docuseries produced by the British Broadcasting Corporation, saying it was a ‘propaganda piece’ that lacked objectivity and reflected its colonial mindset. While the BBC did not make it available in India, some YouTube channels appear to have uploaded it, sources said. express read PM Rashtriya Bal Puraskar for Vizag’s 11-yr-old chess prodigy Amarnath asserts Vizag will be made exec capital in 2 months Visakhapatnam: Child chess prodigy Alana Meenakshi Kolagatla has been chosen for the Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar 2023 for her outstanding achievements in chess. An Indian international chess player, the Class VI student is World No.1 in the Under-12 girls’ catergory as per FIDE ratings in January this year | P4 Visakhapatnam: Minister for IT and Industries Gudivada Amarnath on Saturday said Visakhapatnam will be the executive capital within two months. His remarks assumed significance amidst reports that a crucial statement in this regard would be issued by the government in the Legislative Assembly during the Budget session | P3 TTD sends ‘drone’ clip to forensic lab, warns perpetrators of action E x p r e ss N e w s S e r v i c e @ Tirupati After a video of the Srivari temple, purportedly shot with a drone, went viral on social media platforms, chair man of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) YV Subba Reddy on Saturday said legal action would be initiated against the company who has uploaded the clip. The video has been sent to a forensic lab to ascertain the facts, he added. Refusing claims that the video was shot using a drone camera, the TTD chief told reporters that the temple has Dino nest cluster, eggs found in Narmada Valley An u r a a g S i n g h @ Bhopal A rare discovery of 92 closely located dinosaur nests and 256 fossilised eggs of herbivorous Titanosaurs (one of the largest known dinosaurs) has been made by a team of palaeontologists in Dhar district, which is part of the Narmada Valley in Madhya Pradesh. While dinosaur nests and eggs having been found in the past, too, by other palaeontologists in the Jabalpur region of MP and Balasinor in Gujarat, this recent find raised the possibility of the Narmada Valley being a fertile hatchery for dinosaurs millions of years ago. The research was carried out by a team from Delhi University Indian Institute of Science , Education and Research, Mohanpur-Kolkata and Bhopal in villages of Bagh and Kukshi of Dhar district between 2017 and YouTube has also been instructed to block the video if it is uploaded in future. Sources said that senior officials of multiple ministries — external affairs, home and I&B — examined the video and found it to be an attempt to cast aspersions on the authority and credibility of the Supreme Court of India. It sows divisions among various Indian communities and makes unsubstantiated allegations regarding actions of foreign governments in India, sources said. “The documentary was found to be undermining sovereignty and integrity of India, and having the potential to adversely impact India’s friendly relations with foreign States as also public order within the country said sources. ,” While the Congress and the TMC called it censorship, a group of 302 former judges, ex-bureaucrats and veterans slammed the BBC documentary as a “motivated chargesheet”. been declared as a ‘No Fly Zone’ as per Agama Shastra and maintained that no videos have been recorded with drones till date. “We will receive the reports within two to three days, following which we will take stern legal action against the Hyderabadbased company which has allegedly used old pictures and converted them into a 3D drone video footage,” Subba Reddy said, adding that they would inform the devotees how some miscreants were playing with their sentiments with such fake and tailored P4 videos.  press Intake Executive capital in Vizag within 2 months, asserts IT Minister | P3 One week to go, police yet to give nod to Lokesh’s Yuva Galam | P4 Fossilised femur bone and fossilised eggs of dinosaurs found in Narmada| PTI 2020. A paper on their research by Harsha Dhiman, Vishal Verma, G V R Prasad and others was recently published in the PLOS ONE research journal. “A major inference is that the nests and eggs date back 66 million years ago. It’s quite possible that the Titanosaurs either just came to lay the eggs or the eggs were also hatched there. The eggs show evidence of hatching as well,” Dhiman told this newspaper. PM Modi may visit Hyd on Feb 13, lay stone for railway station works | P5 Long cracks on Badrinath Natl highway cause concern | P8 Germany faces backlash after denying tanks to Ukraine | P9 quarters at the indoor hall. Hours later, the ministry has asked the WFI to cancel all events, including the ongoing ranking meet, until the oversight committee it promised to appoint is in place and takes over the functioning of WFI. The ministry directed WFI to return the entry fees charged from players. The sports ministry issued an order to suspend the assistant secretary of the WFI, Vinod Tomar, with immediate effect. Union sports minister An- urag Thakur had announced that the panel, constituted to probe the charges, will submit its report within four weeks. Its members were to be announced on Saturday but the cherrypicking has been postponed by P11 a day  .