The New Indian Express Wishes its readers a visakhapatnam l thursday l october 31, 2024 l `9.00 l PAGES 12 l late city EDITION Buckingham Palace confirms TNIE report on Charles’ secret India visit The Buckingham Palace confirmed King Charles and Queen Camilla visited Bengaluru for wellness treatment before returning to the UK from Samoa Charles and Camilla during one of their previous visits for treatment | Source: SIHHC B’luru Stop was to break long trip to U.K. not connected to cancer treatment A Buckingham Palace spokesperson said the stopover was to help break the long journey to the United Kingdom from Samoa. “Their Majesties had a short private stopover in India to help break the long journey back from Samoa,” the spokesperson said. They arrived on October 27 and stayed at Soukya International Holistic Health Centre located in Whitefield, Bengaluru ■ ■ ■ Charles is under treatment for cancer after being diagnosed with the disease earlier this year. Sources said the visit was not connected to the cancer treatment, which he will resume upon return to the UK He planted a Jacaranda sapling in the Soukya campus, an official said Charles and Camilla were on a 10-day official trip to Australia and Samoa Our offices and press will remain closed today and there will be no issue of the paper on Friday 75-yr-old King Charles had stayed at soukya retreat nine times earlier 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 new board TV5 owner BR Naidu named TTD Chairman Disengagement Canada minister named complete, troops Amit Shah in Nijjar case to swap sweets Yesh i S e l i @ New Delhi D S uren d ra K umar @ Tirupati The State gover nment on Wednesday announced the new governing board of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) with TV5 owner Bollineni Rajagopal Naidu, popularly known as BR Naidu, as the chairman. Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu’s selection, while widely anticipated, formally ends weeks of speculation surrounding the composition of the TTD board. With three MLAs from Andhra Pradesh, five members from Telangana, three from Karnataka, two from Tamil Nadu, and one each from Gujarat and Maharashtra, the Board includes a diverse group of people. Another member is likely to be appointed soon, with the nomination anticipated to come from the BJP an , alliance partner of the State gover nment. Three T r u s t members — art director Buragapu Anand Sai, Telangana Jana Sena Party vice-president Bongunoori Mahender Reddy and JSP founder-member Anugolu Rangasri — were recommended by JSP president and Deputy Chief Minister Pawan Kalyan. Jaggampeta MLA Jyotula Nehru, Kovur MLA Vemireddy Prashanthi Reddy Madakasira , MLA MS Raju, former Union Minister Panabaka Lakshmi, former Chief Justice of India HL Dattu and Bharat Biotech Co-founder and Managing Director Suchitra Ella were among the newly-appointed TTD board members. However, a few supporters of the TDP JSP and BJP who had , , , lobbied actively for positions on the Srivari Temple Trust, faced disappointment with P4 Naidu’s choices.  India, China wrap up troop pullback from Demchok & Depsang; joint verification is on cation process is progressing and talks are currently on Patrolling will soon begin about the routes, schedule, and at Demchok and Depsang the patrolling size. Each patrolPlains in eastern Ladakh, as ling unit will have a maximum Indian and Chinese troops have of 20 personnel, who will be completed disengagement at carrying their weapons. these friction points along the “The withdrawals are mutuLine of Actual Control (LAC), al and will proceed in phases. sources said on Wednesday To Patrolling may take time, de. mark the de-escalation of ten- pending on the removal of sions and improvestructures set up ment in the overall since the April 2020 mood, the military clashes. Physical personnel will celeverification and surbrate Diwali by exveillance are being changing sweets at conducted in these the traditional areas,” sources points along the said. 3,488-km long LAC. The current disSweet spots engagement is only “The disengagement is complete Troops will exchange for Depsang and and modalities for sweets at traditional D e m ch o k . A r my points — the five patrolling are being sources said that Border Personnel firmed up between talks regarding paground command- Meeting (BPM) huts trolling in other on each side of the ers,” said an Army stand-off points in source. Troops from Line of Actual Control Eastern Ladakh will both sides have dis- spread out in Eastern continue. Troops engaged and shuf- and Western Sectors from both sides have fled back to their already disengaged designated points as per the de- from five other friction points, cision firmed up between the which came up in May 2020 afCorps Commanders of India ter the People’s Liberation and China. Army moved in its personnel The disengagement process in these areas after the clashes involves joint verification on at the Finger Four on the North the ground regarding the troop bank of the Pangong Tso. The and equipment pullback to a patrolling limits and buffer mutually agreed distance from zones in areas found no menthe face-off sites. Sources told tion in the agreement for Demthis newspaper that the verifi- chok and Depsang Plains. M AYA N K S I N G H @ New Delhi express read Group-II Mains exam scheduled to be conducted on January 5 Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh Public Service Commission (APPSC) announced that the Mains exam for Group-II Services will be held on January 5, 2025 in the State. APPSC secretary J Pradeep Kumar explained that as one lakh candidates are likely to appear, the date was fixed taking into consideration the forthcoming DSC, SSC and intermediate board exams. He advised the candidates to visit APPSC website http://psc.ap.gov.in for more details A Canadian minister admitted before a parliamentary panel that he outed Union home minister Amit Shah’s name to a US newspaper as having allegedly ordered a campaign of violence, intimidation, and intelligence-gathering targeting Sikh separatists inside Canada. Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister David Morrison told members of the national security committee that he had confirmed Shah’s name to The Washington Post, which first reported the allegations in connection with the murder of Khalistani radical Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia in June last year. But Morrison did not share any proof of Shah’s alleged involvement in the case. “The journalist called me and asked if it was that person. I confirmed it was that person,” Morrison told the committee. Bilateral relations went into deeper freeze after Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently alleged that the Indian government had a role in the killing Nijjar. Both sides expelled six diplomats each. While India accuses Canada of not even sharing a shread of evidence to support its theory, the latter claims it has ample proof. Nathalie Drouin, Trudeau’s national security adviser, told the committee that Canada has evidence to prove India gathered information on Indian nationals and Canadians in Canada through diplomatic channels and proxies. The information was then passed on to a gangster, Lawrence Bishnoi. E x p ress N e w s S erv i c e M U K E S H R A N J A N @ New Delhi As part of Deepam-2 scheme, the first tranche of free cylinders is set to be delivered to eligible beneficiaries from November 1.   In the run up to the elections, the TDP alliance had promised to supply three free LPG cylinders per year to eligible women as part of the ‘Super Six’ guarantees. During a recent meeting, the State Cabinet had approved the scheme. Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu on Wednesday handed over a cheque of `894 crore to the representatives of Bharat Petroleum, Hindustan Petroleum and Indian Oil Corporation at the State Secretariat for supplying the cylinders. The exchequer will incur an expense of `2,684 crore per ye a r t o i m p l e m e n t t h e scheme. While the scheme came into implementation on Tuesday (October 29) as booking commenced, the Chief Minister will formally give a refill to a The Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) has issued new rules to deal with the recent avalanche of bomb threats to flights across the country. They include figuring out the pseudonymous or anonymous nature of the social media handle from where the threat emerges, geopolitical analysis and the presence of VIPs on board before determining the nature of the threat, officials said on Wednesday . If the threat is categorised as specific, it would trigger the whole range of established security protocols of diverting an aircraft, sending it to an isolation bay, and conducting fresh anti-sabotage checks of passengers and their belongings. But if it is determined a hoax, the flight will be allowed to proceed normally Hundreds . of hoax calls were categorised as non-specific ever since the new rules kicked in on October 19, avoiding all the hassle, sources said. Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu handed over a cheque of `894 crore to representatives of oil companies for supplying first tranche of LPG refills I Express woman beneficiary in Srikakulam district on November 1. As part of the scheme, the State government will supply one refill every four months and release funds as and when necessary Once the . beneficiary books a cylinder, the `876 (excluding the Central subsidy of `25) paid will The ICE policy aims to add over 160 GW of renewable energy, with a potential to attract investments worth `10 lakh crore, thereby generating 7.50 lakh direct and indirect jobs page 4 Two killed, 10 hurt in explosion at EG firecracker store K V S a i l en d ra @ Rajamahendravaram A lightning strike triggered an explosion at the firecracker shop I Express Two women died and 10 others were injured in an explosion at a firecracker shop in Suryaraopalem village in Undrajavaram mandal, East Godavari district on Wednesday The ex. plosion was triggered by a lightning strike. While five were severely hurt, the other five sustained minor injuries. According to East Godavari District Collector P Prasanti, a major fire broke out a fire- cracker shop at Suryaraopalem, 35 km from Rajamahendravaram on Wednesday evening following a lightning strike. Two women — Gummadi Sunitha (38), and Vegarotu Srivalli (35) — were killed on the spot. Srivalli was the wife of the firecracker shop owner, V Sivaji. The injured persons, Kadimi Kumari, Chukka Peddintlu, M Kamala Ratna, Seelam Lakshmi and Vipparti Venkateswara Rao, were shifted to the Tanuku Government Hospital. Their New rules in place to analyse bomb threats @ Vijayawada Integrated Clean Energy Policy notified Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, Union minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, and Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra general secretary Champat Rai offer prayers at the Ram Mandir on the eve of the Diwali festival, in Ayodhya on Wednesday. This is the first Diwali after the Ram Lalla idol was consecrated in the temple | PTI The annual Diwali celebration for the Indo-Canadian community at Parliament Hill was abruptly cancelled by Leader of the Opposition Pierre Poilievre. According to the organisers, the Overseas Friends of India Canada, this was communicated to them abruptly without any explanation. The festival had been celebrated there for the past 23 years Eligible beneficiaries to receive free LPG cylinders from Nov 1 clean energy Let there be light Diwali fest at Parliament Hill off health condition is reportedly serious. On receiving the information, Joint Collector S Chinna Ramudu, fire officer Martin Luther, rushed to the spot and reviewed the situation. Minister for Tourism Kandula Durgesh and MP Daggubati Purandeswari condoled the bereaved families and directed the Collector to extend all help to them. Undrajavaram police registered a case and launched a probe. `5 lakh aid The govt will extend `5 lakh to kin of deceased, `2 lakh for those hurt severely & `1 lakh for the five persons with minor injuries be credited into their bank accounts in 48 hours after the refill is delivered. Civil Supplies Minister Nadendla Manohar, beneficiaries of the scheme — Balamma from Tenali, Bhavani from Eluru and Mangatayaru from Vijayawada — and others were present.