TIRUPATI SUNDAY OCTOBER 20, 2024 `12.00 PAGES 24 LATE CITY EDITION HEZBOLLAH DRONE EXPLODES NEAR NETANYAHU’S HOUSE IN CAESAREA Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the drone targeted the PM’s private residence; Netanyahu was not home at that time 1 DEAD, 4 HURT AS 180 ROCKETS FIRED AT ISRAEL IDF POUNDS GAZA, AT LEAST 50 PEOPLE KILLED In addition to the drone launched at Netanyahu’s private residence in the coastal town, Israel’s military said around 180 projectiles were fired in two separate barrages at northern Israel from Lebanon on Saturday. A 50-yearold man was killed after being hit by shrapnel while sitting in his car in northern Israel and four others were injured, Israel’s medical services said ■ ■ ■ Hezbollah has not claimed responsibility for the drone attack but said it has launched several rockets at northern and central Israel | P9 Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on Saturday continued to press ahead with its armed offensive against Hamas militants still operating from Gaza 50 people, including kids, were reportedly killed in Gaza in past 24 hours 1,418 NUMBER OF PEOPLE KILLED IN LEBANON SINCE LATE SEPTEMBER, ACCORDING TO AFP 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 Waves of bomb threats: DGCA shifted YESHI SELI AND SHEKHAR SINGH @ New Delhi AMID waves after waves of hoax bomb threats shaking up the aviation industry, the government on Saturday shifted the regulator out of the civil aviation ministry . Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) Vikram Dev Dutt was appointed coal secretary as part of a top-level bureaucratic reshuffle. A joint secretary level official is likely to take his place at the earliest, according to sources. The transfers happened on a day when fresh bomb threats forced over 30 flights, including ATROCITY Youth sets girl afire, continued love with her after marriage E X P R E S S N E W S S E R V I C E @ Kadapa IN a horrifying incident, a youth allegedly attempted to murder a minor girl by setting her ablaze in Gopavaram mandal of Kadapa district. According to the police, the accused, Vignesh, who was in an alleged relationship with the victim, planned the attack to eliminate her. He is already married, and his wife is pregnant. The 16-year-old victim is studying first year Intermediate at a private college in Badvel. On Saturday, Vignesh called the girl and threatened to commit suicide if she did not meet him. She skipped the college and met him near the Polytechnic, where they took an autorickshaw to the forest area near Century Plywood unit. It is still unclear as to what transpired between the two, but Vignesh reportedly set her clothes on fire using a lighter and fled the scene. Writhing in pain, the girl managed to walk towards the road, where a truck driver and locals spotted her and alerted the police. Badvel Rural Circle Inspector Nagabhushanam and Urban Sub-Inspector Srikanth arrived at the scene, and rushed her to Badvel government hospital. Later, she was shifted to Kadapa RIMS. The doctors confirmed that the girl had sustained 80% burns, and her condition remains critical. In her testimony to the police, she said both were in love, but he married another woman. “He still wanted me to be with him. He called me yesterday, asking me to come today. There was no fight between P4 us,” she said. ADDING 1 Centre considers TEETH framing a punitive TO law to deal with LAW hoax bomb callers 2 Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) suggests five-year imprisonment for the culprits so as to act as a deterrent those on international routes, to make emergency landings. The affected carriers included Air India, Vistara, IndiGo, SpiceJet, Alliance Air, and Akasa Air. “The Internet Protocol (IP) addresses from the threats today Home ministry consults the law and civil aviation ministries to suitably amend the Aircraft Act and the ones earlier this week have been traced to London, Germany, Canada and the US. However, it is possible the Virtual Private Networks (VPN) were used by some to hide their real locations,’’ a source said. EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Vijayawada passed a unanimous resolution for restoration of statehood in its PAVING the way for the restora- original form. tion of statehood for Jammu & The Centre had on August 5, Kashmir, the Union territory’s 2019 scrapped J&K’s special staLieutenant Governor Manoj Sin- tus and bifurcated the erstwhile ha has cleared the resstate into two Union olution passed by the territories—Jammu RESOLUTION Omar Abdullah-led MUM ON A370 and Kashmir (with Cabinet in this regard. RESTORATION legislature) and Lada“The restoration of kh (without The Omar Abdullahstatehood will be the legislature). led Cabinet’s beginning of a healing “The Cabinet has resolution only process, reclaiming authorised the Chief mentions full the constitutional Minister to take up the statehood for J&K rights and protecting matter with the Prime and does not talk the identity of people Minister and Governabout restoring of Jammu and Kashment of India for resArticle 370, Other mir,” a statement istoration of statehood,” J&K parties accused sued on Saturday read. an official spokesman the NC of reneging It noted that the J&K said. on its poll promise Cabinet has passed a He said protection resolution urging the of Jammu and KashUnion government to restore the mir’s unique identity and the statehood. The Cabinet, which constitutional rights of people met under the chairmanship of remains the cornerstone of the Chief Minister Omar Abdullah newly elected gover nment’s in Srinagar on Thursday, had policy . “DESTINY has finally found its course. After five years of neglect and crushed hopes, Amaravati rises again today. Our people’s capital will now be rebuilt -- brick by brick, heart by heart. I congratulate my people of Andhra Pradesh as we reclaim our dream of a Capital City today -- especially our farmer sisters and brothers who kept our dream alive through their protests, and stood strong against every brutality unleashed. The work restarts today Onward . and upward!” This social media post of Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu reflects his emotions as he relaunched the construction works of the capital city Amaravati, his dream project, at R ayap u d i v i l l a g e o n Saturday . He inaugurated the construction work at the CRDA THE Group of Ministers (GoM) constituted by the GST Council to look into the demand for lower rates on health and life insurance premium recommended a complete GST waiver on health insurance premium for senior citizens. Sources said the GoM, headed by the Bihar deputy chief minister Samrat Choudhary also recommended , that no GST be levied on health insurance premium where the sum insured is up to `5 lakh. For all other health insurance Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu at the relaunch of works at the CRDA office in Rayapudi on Saturday | PRASANT MADUGULA office, which was 80% complete when the TDP government stepped down in 2019. The total project cost was `160 crore. Now, with the resumption of the work, the remaining 20% is expected to be completed soon. It marks the beginning of the mega capital city project, which is being touted as a game changer for the region. Addressing a gathering on the occasion, the Chief Minister reiterated that One State One Capital is their policy, and asserted that the Port City of Visakhapatnam will be developed as a financial capital, and a High Court bench and industries will be set up in Kurnool. MURDER-FOR-HIRE U.S. CHARGES BOGUS, CLAIMS VIKASH YADAV’S COUNSEL U J W A L J A L A L I @ New Delhi “We will reconstruct Amaravati which is a self-financing project. Some vested interests, particularly those who were at the helm of the affairs earlier had resorted to a propaganda that lakhs of crores of rupees would have to be spent for building Amaravati,” he said. The Chief Minister said Vision-2047 is only aimed at developing the State and the 420s (deceivers) cannot understand his vision. With just a call given by him, 29,881 farmers had come forward to give 34,241 acres in Amaravati region for the State capital, Naidu said, asserting that the whole credit of pooling the maximum extent of land in the entire world goes only to the TDP government. Thanking the women who waged a valiant fight against the previous gover nment which created several problems for them, Naidu said he P4 too joined their fight. ED sleuths raid ex-MP MVV’s residences and offices in Vizag EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Vijayawada/Visakhapatnam STAR TAIL Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-Atlas captured near Lingaraj Temple in Bhubaneswar on Friday night. It’s considered the brightest in over a decade | RAKESH KUMAR ROUL GoM moots GST relief for health insurance premium D I PA K M O N D A L @ New Delhi In less than a week, hoax bomb threats have impacted close to 70 flights. On Saturday, officials from the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) had a meeting with the CEOs of different airline operators in the civil aviation ministry . They were briefed about the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for tackling threats, which cause fear and inconvenience to passengers and losses for the airlines. The DGCA and the BCAS are expected to issue fresh guidelines to manage the situation. The civil aviation ministry is reviewing regulations to introduce harsher penalties. CM relaunches works in Amaravati J&K full statehood step closer with nod of L-G FAYA Z W A N I @ Srinagar 3 policies, the GoM has proposed 18% GST. As far as life insurance policies are concerned, most panel members favoured complete waiver of GST on term insurance premium. Term insurance policies offer a sum assured only at the death of the policyholder. These do not have any investment component attached to them. Separately, the GoM on GST rate rationalisation, too, met in Delhi on Saturday and recommended a three-slab structure instead of the existing four-tier tax structure—5%, 12%, 18%, and 28%. Sources said the slabs will be based on pricing with high-value items attracting GST at higher rates. The panel also decided to lower tax rates 28% GST FOR LUXURY WATCHES, SHOES The GoM also suggested hiking GST on shoes above `15,000 a pair and on wrist watches above `25,000 from 18% to 28%. Sources said some items currently in the 18% slab, such as hair dryers, hair curlers, and make-up preparations could be put in the 28% bracket on 20-litre packaged drinking water bottles, bicycles, and exercise notebooks to 5% from 18%. The proposals include cutting GST on bicycles costing under `10,000 to 5% from 12%. The panel has also suggested higher GST for some luxury items (see box). According to one of the members of the GoM, this would help the government mop up `22,000 crore more, thus making up for the revenue losses due to reduction in GST rates on health and life insurance premiums. The six-member GoM on rate rationalisation is also headed by the Bihar deputy CM. THE counsel of former Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) officer Vikash Yadav on Saturday termed the charges brought against his client by the US law enforcement agencies as bogus and part of an international ploy to defame India. “He (Vikash Yadav) is being deliberately framed. It appears that all this is an international plot to defame India and the country’s top intelligence agencies,” advocate R K Handoo told this newspaper. Yadav, a former government officer, was indicted by the US authorities for his alleged role in a foiled murder-forhire plot against Khalistani separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun on US soil. In a completely unrelated case of ex- CLEAN tortion, Yadav was arrested by the Delhi RECORD Police in December last year and lodged The interim bail in Tihar Jail for four months till he got order by a Delhi regular bail. The extortion-cum-kidnap- court referred to ping case was registered by the Special Yadav as “an Cell of the Delhi Police on the complaint ex-government of a businessman in Delhi’s Rohini. employee having The FIR said Yadav demanded money clean antecedents” in the name of gangster Lawrence Bishnoi, forced the victim to sign a blank cheque, took `50,000 from his cafe and deleted all CCTV recordings there. As for the US indictment, advocate Handoo denied all allegations and said that if anyone reads the charges from a proper perspective, they would understand that all of them are fallacious. “As I understand being his lawyer, Vikash is a decent, well-read, and well-cultured man. I cannot fathom that he can be involved in any such activity Handoo said. ,” EXPRESS READ WITH THIS ISSUE Heavy rains likely in Uttarandhra today Vijayawada: Heavy rains are expected at isolated places in North Coastal Andhra Pradesh on Sunday. Thunderstorms and lightning are likely across the State during the same period. Light to moderate rains are also forecast for some areas | P4 The Sound of Music PLUS 12 PAGES SLEUTHS of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) carried out searches at former YSRC MP MVV Satyanarayana’s residences and offices at five locations in Visakhapatnam on Saturday . Sources said the ED zonal unit filed a case against the former MP and a few others based on Visakhapatnam police FIRs in connection with grabbing of government land at Yendada village. The former MP allegedly encroached the land where the government proposed to build houses for orphans and senior citizens. In 2008, the State government gave 12.51 acres of land to Haigreeva Infratech Projects Ltd promoters Ch Jagadeeswarudu and his wife for developing homes for orphans and senior citizens. As per the Visakhapatnam police FIRs, complainant Jagadeeswarudu stated that in 2020 Satyanarayana of MVV Builders and another builder Gadde Brahmaji forged his and his wife’s signatures that the land parcel concerned was sold to them. Based on the FIRs by the Visakhapatnam police, the ED filed a case against MVV and others, and made searches at his residences and a few of his real estate partners, and reportedly seized land documents.
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