chennai l saturday l june 01, 2024 l `9.00 l PAGES 20 l late city EDITION Guilty on all counts: Donald Trump now a convicted felon First ex-prez to be convicted of a crime A jury found the ex-US president guilty on each of the 34 counts of falsifying records to hide a payment to silence porn star Stormy Daniels $35-million fund boost to don’s campaign According to the grand jury, Donald Trump paid $130,000 to the adult film star to prevent her from publicising an alleged sexual encounter with him that could have been fatal to his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump, 77, is the first ex-US president to be convicted of any crime. This, however, does not bar the Republican presumptive nominee from running for president | P13 ■ Trump can become president if he wins the election, even if he is sent to jail. In theory, he can get four years in jail but is more likely to get probation ■ The former president has indicated he will appeal verdict. “This was a rigged trial by a conflicted judge who was corrupt,” he said. His campaign team said support for him is intact, adding $35 million was raised soon after the verdict July 11, 2024 When Judge Juan Merchan will decide whether to send Trump to jail or not 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 25 on poll duty among 74 heatstroke deaths to heatstroke. Three other polling officials died in Rohtas, while Kaimur and Aurangabad districts reported one such death each. In Odisha, sunstroke fatalities were reported in Rourkela city, Jharsuguda, Sambalpur and Balangir districts. In Jharsuguda, most of the victims were drivers by profession. In Jharkhand, over 1,300 people were admitted to hospitals due to heat-related issues. Heat wave conditions are expected to persist during the last phase of polling on Saturday . The temperature sensor at Nagpur registered a maximum of 56°C on Thursday but it was attributed , to a sensor error a day later. Ramashankar and Asish M e h ta @ Patna/ Bhubaneswar Roadside vendors rest in the shade beneath a stationary train coach on a hot summer day in Mumbai | AP Ahead of school reopening, 1.5K pvt ones await recognition N D h a m o t h a r a n @ Coimbatore Of the 7,000-odd private schools in Tamil Nadu getting ready to reopen in the next 10 days, recognition of about 1,500 schools, or over 20% of them, has not been renewed yet by the school education department for academic year 2024-2026 due to various deficiencies. According to official sources, as per norms, private matriculation schools must submit application for renewal of recognition once every three years by submitting certificates for building licence, structural stability, fire and sanitation, among others. Since 2016, private schools were also mandated to get regularisation certificate for their buildings from the Directorate of Town and Country Planning (DTCP) or Local Planning Authority (LPA). The schools should then submit the certificate to the school education department to get their recognition renewed. “But thousands of private schools could not get the certificate from DTCP or LPA as they had constructed their buildings 20 to 30 years ago with the consent of local bodies,” a senior official said. P7 TN School reopening postponed to June 10 Chennai: The school education department has postponed the reopening of schools in TN after summer leave from June 6 to June 10 due to the severe heatwave. At least two political parties had demanded the reopening to be postponed citing harsh summer. Continued on p2 Popularity test for VIPs in final phase of polls Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking third consecutive term; five ministers in the fray Prasad Yadav’s daughter Misa @ New Delhi Bharti, and Congress’ Manish Tewari. The prestige of actor A clutch of VIPs will face their Kangana Ranaut and Himachal popularity test in the last of minister Vikramaditya Singh seven phases of the general Singh is at stake in Mandi. elections on Saturday At stake . Taranjit Singh Sandhu, is the reputation of big hitters former envoy to the US, is pitsuch as Prime Minister ted against Akali Dal’s Anil Narendra Modi, his five Joshi in Amritsar. Union mincabinet colleagues and ister R K Singh is aiming at a Opposition leaders hat-trick from Arrah, like the Trinamool where his challenger is Congress’s Abhishek Sudama Prasad, a sitting Banerjee. While Modi MLA of the CPI(ML) is meditating at the Liberation. Vivekananda Rock In Varanasi, those conmemorial in KanniyaParliamentary testing against Modi are kumari, his party constituencies Ajay Rai (Congress), leaders are managing (General 41; ST 3; SC 13) in Ather Jamal Lari (BSP), 8 States/UTs go to polls Kolisetty Shiva Kumar the Varanasi joust. In all, 57 Lok Sabha (Yuga Thulasi Party), 42 Assembly seats spread across Gagan Prakash Yadav, constituencies (General seven states — Bihar, 27; ST 6; SC 9) of Odisha (Apna Dal, Kameravadi), Uttar Pradesh, West assembly, too, will have and independents Dinesh Beng al, Himachal simultaneous polling Kumar Yadav and Sanjay Pradesh, Jharkhand, Kumar Tiwari. Odisha, Punjab — and 10.9 lakh polling In Patna Sahib, BJP the Union territory of officials deployed veteran Ravi Shankar Chandigarh will go to Over 10.06 cr electors Prasad is eyeing a second polls. Modi is seeking to cast their votes - 5.24 consecutive term. his third consecutive cr male; 4.82 cr female In Bengal, the seventh re-election from Vara- and 3,574 third gender phase will cover Dum nasi. His cabinet colDum, Barasat, Basirhat, league Anurag Thakur Jayanagar, Mathurapur, is seeking re-election from Diamond Harbour, Jadavpur, Hamirpur. He is pitted against Kolkata Dakshin, and Kolkata Congress’ Anand Sharma. Uttar, where the Trinamool seOther prominent BJP leaders cured victories in 2019. in the fray are Anupriya Patel, Late Mukhtar Ansari’s brothR K Singh, Mahendra Nath Pan- er Afzal Ansari is in the fray dey, Pankaj Chaudhary, Lalu from Ghazipur. RA J ESH K UMAR THA K UR Phase 7 facts 57 At least 74 people, including 25 polling personnel in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, succumbed to heatstroke in the last 48 hours. The maximum casualty was in Odisha, where the suspected heatstroke toll stood at 36. UP followed with 20, Bihar 14, and Jharkhand four. In UP, 15 poll personnel (13 in Mirzapur district and two in Sonbhadra district) died following high fever and high blood pressure amid heatwave conditions. As for Bihar, most of the deaths were reported from Bhojpur where five polling personnel succumbed Positive story GDP beats estimates, logs 8.2% expansion in 2023-24 Express News Service Stellar growth @ New Delhi INDIa’s real GDP grew at a fabulous 8.2% in FY24 against 7% in FY23. This is 60 bps higher than the second advance estimates, which pegged growth at 7.6%. This is also the third successive year of 7%-plus growth. It beats both RBI’s forecast of 7% and consensus estimates of 7.6-7.8%, and retains India’s position as the world’s fastest growing major economy for the third year in a row. However, Q4 growth slowed marginally to 7.8%, lower than the 8%-plus growth registered in each of the previous three quarters of FY24. According to provisional estimates released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation on Friday, real GDP, in abso- 8.2% 9.7% 7% 3.9% FY24 FY23 FY22 FY21 FY20 `173.82L cr GDP size in FY24, up from FY23’s `160.71 lakh cr lute numbers, stood at `173.82 lakh crore in FY24 against `160.71 lakh crore a year before, while gross value added was `295.36 lakh crore. Likewise, Q4 real GDP stood at `47.24 lakh crore against Prajwal in police custody till June 6 Suspended JD(S) MP Prajwal Revanna, facing sexual abuse allegations, was remanded in police custody on Friday, hours after he was arrested by a special team upon his return from Germany | P7 Abhineta queers Neta’s pitch in Bihar’s Karakat RAMASHAN K AR @ Patna Illustration: Mandar Pardikar WHEN the going gets tough, the tough gets going.” This old saying holds true for former Union minister and Rashtriya Lok Morcha (RLM) chief Upendra Kushwaha, the NDA candidate in Bihar’s Karakat Lok Sabha constituency The . seat is witnessing a close triangular fight after Bhojpuri actor-cumsinger Pawan Singh entered the fray as an Independent. Paw a n w a s earlier with the BJP and positioned himself as a rebel candidate against the NDA pick Upendra. He was expelled from the BJP sacked after he ignored the party’s order to stand down. He belongs to the dominant Rajput upper caste, the traditional vote bank of the NDA with an estimated strength of around 1.5 lakh. Before the popular star’s entry, Upendra was pitted against CPIML’s Rajaram Singh. But the dramatic entry of Pawan, who has a From left: Rajaram Singh, Pawan Singh, and Upendra Kushawha huge fan following, alarmed NDA leaders. “The former had an edge considering the caste equation in the constituency,” says Dinesh Kushwaha, a resident of Dehri-onSone. Sensing trouble, the NDA brass called in Rajput leaders including Union defence minister Rajnath Singh, former MP and NDA candidate from Sheohar Lovely Anand, and MLC Sanjay Singh to campaign for Upendra, who had won Karakat in 2014. The sitting MP is JD(U)’s Mahabali Singh, who had defeated Upendra in 2019 when the latter was contesting on a Rashtriya Lok Samta Party ticket. This time, Mahabali vacated the seat under NDA’s seat-sharing pact. Caste is a major factor in this election as voters consider the victory of a candidate from their community a prestige issue. There are 2.40 lakh Kushwahas in the constituency followed by Yadavs -5.8% GDP growth (%) (3.5 lakh), Brahmins (1 lakh), Bhumihars (80,000), Paswan (30,000) and Ravidas (1.5 lakh). While Upendra is mainly banking on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity and development works, Rajaram is relying on the Muslim-Yadav combination of RJD besides CPI-ML cadre votes. “We have a strong support base in the constituency,” claimed Subhankar Rai, a CPI-ML supporter. On his part, Pawan promises to generate employment, promote organic farming, develop film industry, re-open closed factories, and establish IT park if elected. He has made the contest pretty colourful by roping in a host of Bhojpuri actors and singers, including Khesarari Lal Yadav, Pakhi Hedge, Manoj Tiger, Sona Singh, Shilpi Raj, Astha Singh, Aayaz Khan and Shivani Singh. It needs to be seen if the crowds will turn into votes. (This is the concluding piece of the series that began on April 10, capturing the ground situation and giving readers a sense of the pulse ofthe nation.) `43.84 lakh crore a year ago. On the expenditure side, FY24’s growth was driven by domestic investments, which grew by 8.9%, while private consumption and government consumption remained subdued. Sources said private consumption will likely fare better given that it recorded a decent growth of 9.4% between FY21 and FY23, notwithstanding the postpandemic affects on spending. On the supply side, the agriculture sector saw a heart-sinking 1.4% growth; services sector growth too was less than desired at 7.6%. Industries sector turned in a relatively better performance of 9.7% growth in FY24. Manufacturing saw 9.9% growth against a 2.2% contraction in FY23. Mining sector grew 7.1% in FY24 compared to 1.9% a year ago. Corporate hosps favoured in organ donation nod: HC R SIVA K UMAR @ Chennai The Madras High Court has observed that corporate hospitals in Tamil Nadu have been favoured by the health department’s authorisation committee for issuing approval for organ transplantation compared to non-corporate hospitals. Justice G R Swaminathan made the remarks on Friday while passing orders on petitions filed by J Rajkumar, a railway employee, seeking a direction to give approval for organ donation from a non-relative donor to the petitioner, as forwarded by Muthu Hospital in Chennai. “If approval is required from the department for a procedure, ‘ ’ (corporate) hospital will see A to it that while its applications are fast-tracked and given a green signal, the applications of ‘B’ (non-corporate) hospital are not fast-tracked and if possible rejected,” the HC said. P7
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