tirupati l monday l february 05, 2024 l `9.00 l PAGES 12 l late city EDITION In joint operation, u.s. and u.k. hit 36 Houthi targets in Yemen The US, UK troops bombed Houthi targets at 13 locations in Yemen, with support from Australia, NZ, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands Strikes to degrade militia’s capability: us Rebels warn of escalation of conflict The US Central Command in a X post said it struck Houthis’ multiple underground storage facilities, command and control, missile systems, UAV storage and operation sites, radars and helicopters. The strikes will degrade Houthis’ capabilities to attack US navy, merchant vessels in the region and make international water safe and more secure, the US said ■ ■ “These attacks will not discourage Yemeni forces from maintaining their support for Palestinians in the face of the Zionist occupation and crimes,” Houthi military spokesman Brig Gen Yahya Saree said. “The aggressors’ airstrikes will not go unanswered,” he added Separately, US struck a Houthi anti-ship cruise missile in self-defence 30 attacks were carried out by houthis in the region since nov 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 PMO directs action against Patanjali for misleading ads K AVITA B A J E L I - D ATT @ New Delhi PM Narendra Modi with Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma during the inauguration and foundation stone laying of various projects in Guwahati on Sunday | PTI Past govts shut eyes to places of worship, says PM PM inaugurates Kamakhya temple corridor, other projects worth `11,600 crore in Assam country, he mentioned the record footfall of devotees in IN a veiled attack on the Con- Varanasi after the completion gress, Prime Minister Naren- of the Kashi corridor. “In the dra Modi on Sunday said those past year, 8.5 crore people viswho came to power after Inde- ited Kashi, more than 5 crore pendence could not understand visited Mahakal Lok in Ujjain the significance of places of and over 19 lakh devotees visworship and set a trend of be- ited Kedardham,” the PM said. ing ashamed of the country’s He noted that more than 24 culture and past for polakh people visited Aylitical reasons. odhya after the Ram Addressing a gatherTemple consecration. ing in Guwahati after He said a similar specvirtually inaugurating Those who ran the tacle would unfold in and laying the founda- government for a Guwahati after the Kalong time since tion stone for a number m a k hy a c o r r i d o r Independence of projects in Assam – project, adding that failed to including the Kamaspiritual tourism can understand the khya temple corridor boost the livelihood of significance of project – worth `11,599 places of worship. even the pooerest. crore, Modi said no They set a trend of Apart from the `498 country can grow by being ashamed of crore Kamakhya corerasing its past. ridor project, the other their own culture He said he was hap- for political gains major projects coming py that the situation up in Assam include a PM Narendra Modi changed in the past 10 six-lane road from the years after the BJP’s new airport terminal policies focussed on vikas (de- (`358 crore) in Guwahati, upvelopment) and virasat (herit- gradation of Nehru Stadium to age). Modi added that connect- FIFA standards (`831 crore), a ing Assam’s historical and new sports complex in Chanspiritual places with modern drapur (`300 crore), upgradafacilities is a move aimed at tion of 43 roads, including 38 preserving these sites and ac- bridges, as a part of South Asia celerating development. Subregional Economic CoopNoting the growing enthusi- eration Corridor Connectivity asm for spiritual tourism in the at a cost of over `3,400 crore. RA M ASHA N K AR @ Patna Kejriwal Alleges pressure from bjp to join saffron party Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday claimed that the BJP had been trying to compel him and other AAP leaders to join the saffron party by filing false cases against them THE Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has directed the Ayush ministry to take action against Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali Ayurved for alleged misleading advertisements about its products. Following the PMO directive on January 24, the Ayush ministry wrote to the Uttarakhand Ayush department on February 2 to “take appropriate action”. The PMO’s move came after RTI activist Dr K V Babu complained to it on January 15 flagging Patanjali’s repeated Express read Oz Air Chief Marshal to visit India on Feb 21 New Delhi: In the series of frequent high-level India and Australia interactions pushing ahead bilateral defence and security relationship in recent years, Air Marshal Robert Chipman, Australian Air Chief is scheduled to be in India later this month. Sources confirmed that Air Marshal Chipman is expected to reach India on February 21 and meet all the Indian service chiefs of the defence ministry | P8 Vande Bharat sleeper trains to be ready by Mar New Delhi: The Indian Railways is planning to roll out an ultramodern sleeper version of Vande Bharat trains by March this year. The production of coaches for the sleeper version is in full swing, according to railway officials. Currently, the Railways is running the chair car versions of Vande Bharat trains on 39 routes across the country. The sleeper version will initially cover overnight journeys on select routes | P8 violations of the Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954. Speaking to this newspaper, Dr Babu said both the Ayush ministry and the Uttarakhand State Licensing Authority (SLA) had been dragging their feet over Patanjali’s misleading advertisements of its drugs for diabetes, obesity thyroid , and heart diseases. Dr Babu told this paper that his complaints have been pending with the Drugs Controller General of India, the Union Ayush ministry and Uttarakhand SLA since February 2022. Now that the PMO has intervened, there is hope that some action will be taken, he added. In its letter to the director, Ayurvedic and Unani Services, Dehradun, Uttarakhand, the Ayush ministry said: “Since the subject matter pertains to continuous violations of the Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954, by Divya Pharmacy (a manufacturing Naidu, PK hold seat-sharing talks; JSP likely to contest 30 segments E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ Vijayawada JSP president Pawan Kalyan and TDP supremo N Chandrababu Naidu met at the latter’s Undavalli residence on Sunday afternoon to discuss the sharing of seats between the two parties ahead of the elections.   The parties are said to have achieved a headway in the process as the duo held discussions for nearly three hours. Sources said a final call will be taken after the leaders meet once again on February 8. Naidu and Pawan have decided to go ahead with the seatsharing as the BJP is yet to announce its stand on joining the alliance. They have also reportedly decided to pacify aspirants who would not be getting a ticket. The party chiefs have previously held meetings with their respective parties to zero in on the number of seats they should demand. With the announce- Jana Sena Party president Pawan Kalyan greeting TDP supremo N Chandrababu Naidu at his residence in Undavalli on Sunday | Express ment on seat-sharing being delayed, cadre of both the parties have been confused. Naidu’s unilateral declaration that the TDP would contest from Araku and Mandapet Assembly segments did not sit well with the JSP leaders. Subsequently in a , tit-for-tat move, Pawan Kalyan @ Vijayawada The 44th session of the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly will commence at 10 am on Monday with Governor S Abdul Nazeer addressing the joint session of the Assembly and the Council. While the exact number of days the House will be is session will be decided during the Business Advisory Committee meeting that will be held after the Governor’s address, sources said it may be limited to five days. Finance Minister Buggana Rajendranath Reddy will present the vote-on-account budget on February 6. With the election schedule likely to be notified in the second fortnight of the month, the State government’s focus will be on allocation of funds for its flagship programmes. It will lay emphasis on highlighting the welfare and development initiatives introduced over the last five years and explain how much has been spent on various schemes, particularly through DBT. TDP to raise 10 issues On the other hand, TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu chaired a meeting of the TDP Legislative Party. It has been learnt that the Opposition will take up 10 issues during the budget ses- Disqualification pleas Monday is the last day for YSRC rebel MLAs to explain on the disqualification pleas filed against them. The High Court had rejected their plea seeking a stay on the proceedings announced that the JSP would contest from Rajanagaram and Razole Assembly seats. The Jana Sena has been demanding more seats in the erstwhile Godavari and Visakhapatnam districts, stating that it has a considerable base in these P4 regions.  N a m i ta b a j pa i @ Lucknow IN a major breakthrough, the Anti-Terrorist Squad of the Uttar Pradesh police (UP ATS) arrested here an employee of the Indian embassy in Moscow for allegedly spying for Pakistan’s ISI. Satendra Siwal, an employee of the Indian Embassy in Moscow, was produced in a local court and sent to 14-day judicial remand. Police sources said, on Monday the ATS would move court to take Siwal’s remand. Two mobile phones, an Aadhar Card, a PAN card, an identity card and R600 cash were recovered from him. Siwal was passing on confidential information about defence installations to his ISI handlers across the border for money, UP ATS sources said. He was engaged as the Indiabased MultiTasking Staff at the Indian Embassy in Moscow. The ATS claimed that it had information from the sources and surveillance that some of the External Affairs ministry employees were being lured by ISI with money to disclose strategic information about Indian defence installations and other details thus posing a serious threat to country’s security . The ATS called Siwal for interrogation. During the grilling, he was not able to answer the queries of ATS satisfactorily On further questioning, he . admitted to having engaged in allegedly spying for the ISI, ATS said in a statement. After which, ATS lodged an FIR against him for waging war against the country . ‘KCR & Jagan conspired against TS’ share in Krishna waters’ B K a r t h eek @ Hyderabad Hitting back at the BRS over comments on handing over the Srisailam and Nagarjuna Sagar projects to the Krishna River Management Board (KRMB), Telangana Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy on Sunday alleged that his predecessor, K Chandrasekhar Rao, and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy had conspired against Telangana’s rightful share of Krishna waters. Addressing a press conference along with Irrigation Minister N Uttam Kumar Reddy and Endowments Minister Konda Surekha, he stated that KCR submitted himself to the commissions as part of an agreement with Jagan and didn’t attend the meeting convened by the Union govern- ment on August 5, 2020. “This absence resulted in him not opposing the Rayalaseema Lift Irrigation Scheme, leading to Andhra Pradesh issuing tenders on August 10, 2020, for the extraction of 8 tmcft of water. KCR’s greed for money laid the foundation of the ‘Rayalaseema Lift Ir rigation Scam’.” Revanth further accused the Budget session from today, Governor to address joint sitting of Assembly E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e unit owned by Patanjali), it comes under the jurisdiction of the State Licensing Authority, Uttarakhand... it is requested to examine the matter and take necessary action as deemed appropriate.” The DMR (OA) 1954 says: “No person shall take any part in the publication of any advertisement referring to any drug in terms which suggest or are calculated to lead to the use of that drug for the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment or prevention of any diseases, disorder or condition.” Uttar Pradesh ATS arrests MEA staff for spying for ISI sion, including public debt, job calender, inflation, the State government’s failure to give weekly offs to police personnel, alleged allocation of thousands of acres to ‘benamis’ under the pretext of solar power projects, hike in power tariff, and failure in declaring drought mandals and helping those affected by Cyclone Michuang. Terming YS Jagan Mohan Reddy as the biggest failed chief minister in history Naidu , accused him of spewing lies. Releasing the TDLP charge sheet against the YSRC government, Naidu alleged that Jagan has not even fulfilled 21% of the 730 promises he made during his padayatra. The party’s deputy floor leader in the Assembly K Atchannaidu and the leader of opposition in the Legislative Council Yanamala Ramakrishnudu, MLAs and MLCs were present. former chief minister of being accountable for the development of projects along the Krishna river — such as Pothireddypadu, Rayalaseema and Muchumarri — undertaken by the AP government from 2004 to 2023. He criticised KCR for settling for 299 tmcft, representing 68% of the Krishna river in Telangana, contrary to the alleged “rightful share” of 512 tmcft in Krishna. The BRS chief agreed to hand over the Krishna and Godavari waters to KRMB when the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014, was passed, Revanth said. He employed expletives against the former chief minister and asserted that the losses incurred by Telangana during KCR’s regime far exceeded the cumulative losses experienced during the period of all rulers combined in undivided Andhra P5 Pradesh.  JMM hopeful of winning J’khand trust vote today M U K E SH RA N J A N @ Ranchi Gill gets going at 3 After a string of failures, Shubman Gill slammed a century (104), his first at No. 3, to put India in driver’s seat in second Test against England on Sunday | pti Jharkhand Mukti Morcha MLAs returned here on Sunday evening ahead of the floor test in the Assembly on Monday after Champai Soren was sworn in as the chief minister last week. Soon after Champai’s swearing in ceremony around 37 MLAs were taken to a resort in Hyderabad to prevent them from poaching. There they were kept under tight security and were not allowed to meet or talk to anyone even on their mobile phones. From the airport, the MLAs were taken directly to the circuit house and will stay the night there before going to the assembly on Monday morning. The MLAs were taken to Hy- derabad after rumours spread that JMM does not have the required numbers to pass the floor test in assembly . Jharkhand assembly has 81 seats. JMM-led alliance has support of 47 MLAs, six more than the half way mark making it a cakewalk for it to win the floor test. JMM has 29 seats, Congress has 17 seats while RJD and CPI (ML) have one seat each. One assembly seat is vacant. NDA, on the other hand, has a total strength of 32 MLAs. BJP has 26 MLAs, AJSU has 3, NCP (AP) has one seat along with two Independent MLAs. Though the JMM is confident of winning the trust vote, BJP MLA Biranchi Naryan has said that the Champai government will lose the floor test on Monday .