Putin’s fiercest critic alexei Navalny, 47, dies in Arctic jail Russian opposition leader on Friday died in prison. After a walk, he felt unwell and lost consciousness his team could not confirm death An ambulance arrived to resuscitate him, but he died, according to a prison statement. Navalny’s team said it has no confirmation of his death and his lawyer is travelling to the Arctic Circle prison where he was serving 19-year sentence since December on charges of extremism. The prison is known for its long, harsh winters. Navalny’s allies decried his transfer to the jail 1,900 km is the distance of the prison from Moscow chennai l saturday l february 17, 2024 l `9.00 l PAGES 22 l late city EDITION Navalny rose to prominence for his campaign against official corruption | P15 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 Trust vote ahead of Kejri’s court date Govt-farmer talks +ve, anup ve r m a @ New Delhi Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday moved a confidence motion in the Assembly a day before he is to ap, pear before a local court for ignoring five summonses from the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection with the excise policy case. The discussion on the motion will be held on Saturday. AAP is set to win the trust vote comfortably as it has 62 MLAs while the opposition BJP has eight, seven of whom have been suspended for the rest of the session for interrupting Lt Governor V K Saxena’s speech in the Assembly on Thursday . The ED has already sent its sixth summons to Kejriwal asking him to appear on Monday for questioning in connection with the scam. Speaking in the Assembly, Kejriwal reiterated there was no scam in the excise policy He . alleged attempts were being made to poach AAP MLAs and topple his government by registering false cases and arrest- Cong a/cs frozen, defrozen in hours Tribunal to hear appeal on `210 cr Income Tax demand P r ee t h a N a i r @ New Delhi test wickets and the legend grows The milestone finally came on Friday when India’s R Ashwin dismissed England’s Zak Crawley to reach his 500th Test wicket — the second Indian to reach the magic figure after Anil Kumble (619 wkts). His record is crazy. England were 207/2 in reply to India’s 445 I P17 Ashwin withdraws In a late-night development, the Indian cricket board said that the Tamil Nadu spinner has withdrawn from the rest of the Test due to a medical emergency in the family Hours after the Congress announced that its main accounts were frozen, the Income Tax department on Friday granted it temporary relief by lifting the freeze till a final hearing by its appellate tribunal next Wednesday The accounts were . frozen on a tax demand of `210 crore for 2018-19 as penalty for a 45-day delay in filing returns and cash contributions from its lawmakers, said the party It . appealed against the demand to the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT). In its order, the tribunal directed the party to ensure that the accounts have a minimum deposit of `115 crore as lien. In a video message, Congress Rajya Sabha MP Vivek Tankha, who appeared before the ITAT, said the tribunal defroze the accounts and will hear the matter next Wednesday before taking the final call. “On our petition, the I-T department and the ITAT said we have to ensure that `115 crore is kept in the banks. Any amount over and above `115 crore can be spent. This means that `115 crore has been frozen. The `115 crore is much more than what we have in our current accounts,” the party said. Earlier in the day, senior Congress leader and treasurer Ajay Maken told a press conference that the I-T department had frozen four main accounts of the Congress and the Youth Congress on frivolous and flimsy grounds leaving the party with no money to pay bills and salaries. “The crowdfunding money in our accounts has been frozen just two weeks before elections. When the opposition’s accounts are frozen, it is equivalent to freezing democracy said Maken. ,” “Since 2019 was an election year, the Congress submitted receipts of `199 crore spent on the elections. Of this amount `14.40 lakh had been deposited in cash by some Congress MPs and MLAs from their salaries,” said Maken adding that it was shocking that the I-T department had imposed a penalty of `210 crore on the cash deposit of `14.40 lakh. In his pushback, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said, “Don’t be scared, Congress is not the party whose strength is money power, its strength is people’s power.” The five members As per an order from the governor’s office, retired IAS officer M P Sivanarul, IRS officer R Saravanakumar, Dr A Thavamani, Usha Sukumar, and R Premkumar have been appointed as new members of the TNPSC The seven-month-long standoff between the DMK government and Governor R N Ravi over the appointment of members to the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission (TNPSC) finally ended on Friday with the governor approving the names of five people , to be appointed members of the commission. The impasse ended after the state government responded positively to certain recommendations from the governor’s office over the appointments in accordance with law, sources said. As per an order from the governor’s office, retired IAS officer M P Sivanarul, who was former special officer for modernisation of cooperative societies, IRS officer R Saravanakumar, Dr A Thavamani, Usha Sukumar, and R Premkumar have been appointed as new TNPSC members.  Continued on p7 Banks told to pay up Sharing two such I-T notices sent to its bankers — Bank of Baroda and SBI — Maken said the tax authorities directed them to pay them `135 crore and `75 crore, respectively, as income tax dues from the Congress accounts with them. The notice also held the bankers personally liable for paying the amount to the tax authorities 10 lakh to sit for Group IV About 10 lakh aspirants may sit for Group IV exam in June. Appointment of five new members may help speed up the TNPSC recruitment process class 10 exam for 600 marks Mother tongue optional paper for TN boards B i n i ta J a i s w al @ Chennai Class 10 state board students who opt for their mother tongue, along with Tamil as the main language, will have to write public exam for 600 marks. The school education department has issued an order in this regard on Friday . As per the order, students who go for this optional language subject along with Tamil for Class 10 exam will have to write six subjects for a total of 600 marks. Other students will write the board exam for sub- jects like Tamil, English, Mathematics, Science and Social Science and their total marks will remain 500. The new system will be implemented from 202425 academic year. According to officials, currently, exams are being conducted for non-Tamil language subjects such as Kannada, Malayalam, Telugu, Urdu, and Arabic, but marks in these subjects are not taken into account for deciding if a candidate has passed the exam or not. But as per the new rule, these students must secure at least 35 marks to pass the optional subject. When asked about the possibility of disparity in total marks creating confusion in Class 10 exams, director of school education G Arivoli said, “There will be no problem in implementing the new system. Students who wish to write the board exam for five subjects will be scored for 500, while those who opt for six subjects will be evaluated for 600 marks.”  p7 express read Separate project division set up for Mekedatu reservoir, says K’taka CM Bengaluru: Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah on Friday told the state Assembly that a separate project division and two sub-divisions have been set up to implement the Mekedatu Balancing Reservoir project in Cauvery. A survey to identify land that will be submerged and counting of trees to be felled have started, Siddaramaiah said | P7 Former union minister MK Alagiri acquitted in poll officer attack case Stalemate ends, guv approves five new members for TNPSC B A N B U S E LV A N @ Chennai ing its leaders. Tabling the motion, Kejriwal said he wants to show how BJP’s ‘Operation Lotus’ has failed in Delhi. A few operatives recently approached seven AAP MLAs asking them to join the BJP for which they will receive `25 crore and an election ticket, he alleged. All AAP MLAs rejected the offer, he alleged. Minimum marks 35 “Students who will write Class 10 exam for five subjects will be scored for 500 marks, while those who opt for six subjects will write for 600,” says director of school education G Arivoli Madurai: Former union minister MK Alagiri and 16 others were acquitted in a case involving attack on a tahsildar during poll campaign in 2011. Tahsildar M Kalimuthu, who was assistant returning officer, was allegedly attacked for video-recording a group of cadres campaigning at a temple in Melur | P2 next round on Sunday H A R P R E E T B A J W A @ Chandigarh THE third round of talks between farmers and the Centre ended on a positive note with resolution emerging on many sticking points, sources said, but no breakthrough could be achieved as some outstanding issues are yet to be sorted out. The next round of talks will be held on Sunday evening. Till then, the farmers will stay put at the Punjab-Haryana border. The five-hour marathon talks, which started on Thursday night, continued till the wee hours on Friday “We had a . positive discussion with the farmer leaders,” said agriculture minister Arjun Munda. Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, who also took part in the talks, said consensus has been achieved on various points but some important issues are pending, which he said will be resolved soon. Farmer leader Sarwan Singh Pandher said the Union ministers sought more time to decide Protesters flee as police deploy tear gas on them at the Shambhu border | pti on the MSP issue. “We want a positive result and do not want any confrontation. We are staying back at the borders. Otherwise, our plan to march to Delhi will continue,” he said. Meanwhile, Haryana police fired tear gas shells to disperse protesting farmers when they moved towards the barricades at the Shambhu border. In a separate incident, 63-year-old Gian Singh from Gurdaspur, who was protesting at the Shambhu border died of heart attack on Friday morning. The Bharat Bandh called by some unions had a mixed reaction in Punjab and Haryana.