Horror as man stabs 6 to death in Sydney mall Sydney: A man stabbed six persons to death at Sydney’s Westfield Bondi Junction mall complex on Saturday before he was fatally shot by police. Eight persons, including a 9-month-old, were injured in the attack. The 40-year-old man began stabbing people at the shopping centre, which was packed with thousands of shoppers. The police have not revealed the killer’s identity. kochi l Sunday l april 14, 2024 l `12.00 l PAGES 26 l late city edition 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 CBI books BJP’s Cong manifesto axed CAA in last hour top donor MEIL in bribery case P r e e t h a N a i r @ New Delhi FIR says Hyderabad-based firm paid C78 lakh to officials to get bills worth C174 crore cleared MUKESH RA N JA N @ New Delhi The New Indian Express wishes its readers a happy Vishu HOLIDAY: Our offices will remain closed today. There will be no issue of the paper tomorrow. EXPRESS READ Andhra CM Jagan hurt in stone pelting Vijayawada: In a clear case of security breach, a stone was pelted at Andhra Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy in Vijayawada during his ‘Memanta Siddham’ bus yatra on Saturday. The YSRC president sustained an injury above his eyebrow and was administered first aid. It is suspected that a slingshot was used to pitch the stone at him.P6 THE Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has registered an FIR against Hyderabad-based Megha Engineering and Infrastructure Ltd (MEIL), which was the biggest donor of electoral bonds to the BJP at `586 crore, in an alleged bribery case. In the FIR, seen by TNIE, the CBI has also named eight officials of the NISP and NMDC and two officials of MECON. The FIR alleges the officials received bribes of `78 lakh for clearing MEIL’s bills worth `174 crore in connection with works related to Chhattisgarh’s Jagdalpur integrated steel plant. According to the electoral bonds data released by the Election Commission following a Supreme Court ruling, MEIL was the second biggest buyer of electoral bonds at `966 crore. Apart from contributing to the BJP, the firm also donated `195 crore to the BRS, `85 crore to DMK, and `37 crore to YSRCP. The TDP got about `25 crore from the company, while the Congress got `17 crore. The JD-S, Jana Sena Party and the JD-U got smaller sums ranging from `5 crore to `10 crore. In the FIR, the CBI has said it had registered a preliminary enquiry (PE) on August 10, 2023 regarding the alleged bribery in `315 crore project related to works of intake well and pump house and cross-country pipeline at the integrated steel plant of the NMDC in Jagdalpur, which was awarded to the company . “Based on the findings of the PE, a recommendation was made on March 18 to register a regular case into the alleged bribery which was filed on March 31,” the FIR read. The CBI has named eight officials of NISP and NMDC Ltd — retired executive director Prashant Dash; director (production) D K Mohanty; deputy general manager P K Bhuyan; D M Naresh Babu; senior manager Subro Banerjee; retired CGM (finance) L Krishna Mohan; general manager (finance) K Rajshekhar; and manager (finance) Somnath Ghosh, who allegedly received `73.85 lakh in bribe. Dog in the Fight Preliminary enquiry filed in Aug 2023 According to the FIR made public on Saturday, CBI had registered a preliminary enquiry on August 10, 2023 about alleged bribery in D315 crore project related to works at the integrated steel plant Jagdalpur in Chhattisgarh FIR names MECON officials CBI also named two MECON officials — AGM Sanjeev Sahay and DGM K Illavarsu — who allegedly got D5.01 lakh against the payment of D174.41 crore by NMDC to MEIL via 73 invoices PLUS 12 PAGES After mounting fierce attacks against the Modi government on implementing the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the Congress appears to have developed cold feet on the law in its recent election manifesto. T hough ‘re pealing and amending of CAA’ figured in the original draft of the manifesto, the top leadership of the party decided to drop it just before releasing the document, said sources. Instead, the party made an omnibus promise in the manifesto that it would repeal all anti-people laws passed by the NDA if the INDIA bloc came to power. “The original draft of the manifesto said that the draconian CAA would be repealed and amended. However, at the last minute, they decided not to list any laws and dropped the mention of CAA,” said a leader privy to the developments. However, when asked about nixing the CAA, a member of the manifesto committee told this paper that under a section called ‘reversing the damage’, the party had promised to repeal various anti-people laws passed by the BJP/NDA without proper parliamentary scrutiny and debate. However, in this section, the party talked about reviewing Actor assault It’s scary that my privacy is not safe in court: Survivor E x p r e s s N e w s S e r v i c e @ Kochi The survivor in the 2017 actor abduction and sexual assault case expressed shock over the report of a judicial probe into the alleged unauthorised access of a memory card containing the visuals of the assault while it was in the custody of court. “It’s tragically shocking,” the survivor wrote on her Instagram handle. She expressed concern that her right to privacy has been violated as the hash value of the memory card got changed multiple times. Recently the High Court had ordered the , District Principal Sessions Court, which is conducting trial of the case, to provide a copy of the report to the survivor. “While privacy is an individual’s fundamental right, what has been denied through the multiple changes to the hash value of the visuals-containing memory card in the (custody of the) court is the right granted to me as an individual by the Constitution of this country And, it’s . very scary to know that my privacy is not currently safe in this court,” she noted. She said when the survivor faces such bad experiences from the part of the court, which is bound to fortify justice, it’s the victims who are shattered. ● More on P6 Tamil vs Thamizh in south Chennai fight S u b a s h i n i V i j aya k u m a r @ Chennai On March 20, Tamilisai Soundararajan entered the state headquarters of the BJP, Kamalalayam, after a gap of nearly five years, to rejoin the party. After collecting her membership card, she said in h e r b o o m i n g vo i c e , “Tamizhagathil Thamarai Malarum, Malarndhe Theerum” (Lotus will bloom in TN, it will inevitably bloom), revitalising a catchphrase she popularised when she was the party’s state president from 2014 to 2019. However, the bloom is yet to happen. Tamil Nadu has eluded the BJP so far Illustration: Mandar Pardikar with the party winning only eight MP seats out of the 105 Lok Sabha contests since 1984. Seven of these victories were thanks to its alliance with either the AIADMK or the DMK. Two days before she rejoined the party, Tamilisai resigned as the Governor of Telangana and Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry, a move that surprised many and signalled the BJP’s intentions to field its heavyweights in key LS constituencies. The BJP is banking on Tamilisai’s relative popularity and downto-earth personality besides a significant presence of Brahmins and an upwardly-mobile population to shake up Chennai South, which has mainly favoured the DMK. Her primary battle is against DMK’s incumbent MP and poet Thamizhachi Thangapandian. If Tamilisai translates to Tamil music, Thamizhachi means Tamil woman. ● More on P9 Citizenship rights Under the CAA, citizenship will be given to persecuted non-Muslim minorities — Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, and Christian — who migrated to India from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh till Dec 31, 2014 and amending laws relating to workers, farmers, criminal justice, environment & forests, and digital data protection. The section has no mention of repealing CAA. After the Union government notified the CAA on January 10, Congress MP Shashi Tha- roor said that the opposition would challenge the law in the Supreme Court, and dubbed it as unconstitutional. Tharoor also asserted that in the Congress manifesto, they will promise the repeal of the CAA, if the INDIA alliance comes to power. The silence of the party on the CAA in its manifesto has become a bone of contention between the Congress and the ruling CPI(M) in Kerala. Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has been consistently attacking the Congress that the silence on the issue reflects its fear of speaking about the contentious Act. Vijayan accused that Congress consciously skipped the CAA. Iran seizes Israel-linked cargo vessel with 17 Indians on board Y e s h i S e l i @ New Delhi a day after India issued an advisory asking its citizens not to travel to Iran and Israel in view of heightened tensions in West Asia, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on Saturday seized a Portugal-flagged cargo ship near the Gulf of Oman near Strait of Hormuz with 17 Indians on board. A video of the capture showed two soldiers sliding down from a helicopter through ropes on the deck of the ship in the Gulf of Oman. “We are aware that a cargo ship ‘MSC Aries’ (Mediterranean Shipping Company) has been taken control by Iran. We are in touch with Iranian authorities through diplomatic channels, both in Tehran and Delhi, to ensure the safety welfare and early re, leased of Indian nationals,’’ an official said. Iranian commandos raiding the ship near the Strait of Hormuz | Ap Sources said Iran’s military seized the ship carrying a total of 25 crew members as it was suspected to have an Israeli connection. The vessel is associated with London-based Zodiac Maritime, owned by Israeli billionaire Eyal Ofer. Iran generally doesn’t target cargo vessels though they have targeted oil tankers in the past. On Saturday , the forces were on the look out for ships linked to Israel travelling through the Strait of Hormuz, which led to the seizure. The MSC is one of the world’s biggest cargo shipping lines. The seizure follows Iran’s threats to respond to a suspected Israeli air strike on April 1 on Iran’s consular building in Damascus, Syria, which killed seven personnel, including two senior commanders.
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