tiruchy 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 as embattled chief opens meet N a mita B a j pa i / Fi 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 . In the eye of the storm after serious allegations, including that of sexual harassment were levelled against him by the agitating wrestlers, Singh has been asked to step aside from the day-to-day functioning of the federation late on Friday night. However, the WFI chief not only inaugurated the threeday tournament as a chief guest but also witnessed the day’s action from close 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 day-to-day functioning of WFI. The ministry directed Pa r v e z S u lta n @ New Delhi The Uncommon Flu PLUS 12 PAGES Oh Boy! a fan moment A boy invaded the pitch to hug captain Rohit Sharma during India’s innings against New Zealand in the second ODI at Raipur on Saturday. Rohit later asked security to not take action against the boy. Chasing 109, India won by 8 wkts to seal series 2-0 | PTI OPS plans own candidate to fight eps in Erode, ready to stay out for BJP ISF workers, police clash in Kolkata Indian Secular Front activists clashed with police in central Kolkata on Saturday during a protest against alleged attacks on the front’s workers by Trinamool Congress in South 24 Parganas | P8 T Mu rugan an d ham @ Chennai A day after the AIADMK faction led by Edappadi K Palaniswami decided to contest the by-election to the Erode East seat, his nemesis O Panneerselvam too joined the fray on Saturday, saying he would field a candidate on behalf of the AIADMK for which he was the coordinator. OPS also said the AIADMK would support the BJP if it decides to contest the by-election since it is a national party and the election comes ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. “We will contest. But if the national party expresses its desire to nominate its candidate, then the AIADMK will extend moral support to its candidate,” Dino nest cluster, eggs found in Narmada Valley A n 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 day but the cherry-picking has been postponed by a day . All eyes will be on the emergency executive committee and special general body meeting of the WFI on Sunday. “WFI president will not attend; secretary-general V N Prasood will chair it,” said an official. Replying to the ministry’s notice, WFI earlier in the day dismissed all allegations and said the protest was motivated and part of a larger plot.  P11 YouTube, Twitter axe BBC series after govt’s fiat WITH THIS ISSUE An injured Indian Secular Front worker lies on a road | PTI the federation to return the entry fees charged from players. In another decision, the sports ministry issued an order to suspend the assistant secretary of the WFI, Vinod Tomar, with immediate effect. Union sports minister Anurag Thakur announced late on Friday night that a panel that will be constituted to probe the charges will submit its report within four weeks. Its members were to be announced on Satur- Panneerselvam said after a discussion with BJP state president K Annamalai. Answering a question on ‘two-leaves’ symbol, OPS said, “If we don’t get the ‘two-leaves’, we will contest on a symbol allotted by the Election Commission. But to avoid the ‘twoleaves’ symbol from being frozen by the EC, we have been insisting on maintaining party unity .” All through the day on Saturday delegations led by OPS and , senior functionaries of the EPS faction called on AIADMK allies BJP and TMC and smaller par ties like T hamizha g a Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam and Puratchi Bharatham to solicit their support.  P4 press Intake NCERT books to be available in Tamil, other languages from next year | P5 TN plans to set up a regional planning authority | 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. PWD to build classes, renovate schools at a cost of D1,200 cr | P4 Two more injured die in Vembakottai fireworks unit explosion | P5 Long cracks on Badrinath Natl highway cause concern | P8 EVKS wants Cong seat for younger son Sanjay Former TNCC president EVKS Elangovan on Saturday clarified that he would not be contesting the by-election to Erode East Assembly constituency, but said he had requested a party ticket for his younger son Sanjay Sampath. Elangovan’s elder son EVR Thirumagan, who represented the constituency, died recently. “The Congress high command will take a decision soon. I will abide by the decision taken by the party leadership,” he said.  P4 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 minis, try on Friday, who invoked emergency powers 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. 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 Trinamool Congress called it censorship, a group of 302 former judges, ex-bureaucrats and veterans slammed the BBC documentary as a “motivated chargesheet”. Security scare Blasts in Jammu add to worry as Rahul’s Yatra to arrive in 2 days Fayaz wani @ 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 following Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra and ahead of the Republic Day The . Yatra is scheduled to arrive in Jammu on Monday . ADG Mukesh Singh said the blasts took place at the Transport Nagar area of Narwal in the morning. “Around 11 am, a blast took place in a Bolero vehicle. Soon after the blast, 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 Singh. The injured have been shifted to the Government Medical College Hospital in Jammu. The condition of one of them is critical. The police, CRPF and Army personnel along with other officials rushed to the spot and sealed the area. “Such dastardly acts highlight the desperation and cowardice of those responsible. No efforts should be spared to bring the perpetrators to justice,” Lt Governor Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha said. Security personnel at the site of the twin blasts in Jammu’s Narwal area | PTI TN centre to conserve, save turtles SV KRI SHNA CHA I TANYA @ Chennai The state government has approved the forest department’s proposal to build a Turtle Conservation and Rehabilitation Centre at Guindy Children’s Park, which is currently undergoing a facelift, in Chennai. The project costing `6.30 crore will have in-house treatment facilities to help injured turtles. “The centre will have facilities like turtle pool and turtle shed in addition to medical facilities for the rehabilitation of rescued turtles. It will act as a temporary home to sick and injured turtles before they are released back to their natural habitat,” said Supriya Sahu, additional chief secretary, enA third-party audit will be done to evaluate the functioning of the conservation centre Supriya Sahu, addl chief secy vironment, forests and climate change department. Supriya Sahu said, “Every year during nesting season, several Olive Ridley turtles get hit by fishing boat engines and their flippers get damaged as they get entangled in nets. Hitherto, we didn’t have any facility to shelter and treat these turtles. They have to either fend for themselves or die a painful death. We are trying to address this gap.”  P5