chennai l Monday l November 04, 2024 l `9.00 l PAGES 12 l vellore EDITION India, China made some progress in disengagement, says Jaishankar India and China have made ‘some progress’ in disengagement, the foreign minister said while interacting with the Indian diaspora in Brisbane It opens up possibility for other steps: EAM “In terms of India and China, yes, we have made some progress,” he said, adding that the disengagement of troops in eastern Ladakh, agreed by India and China, is a welcome step. S Jaishankar said it could open up the possibility that “other steps could happen” that would improve the ties further. He arrived in Australia on Saturday and will fly to Singapore later ■ Fourth India has big role to play in west Asia ■ Jaishankar said India is “trying to do something” to bring peace in both Ukraine and West Asia. In case of the latter, India is one of the few countries that can mediate between Israel and Iran to stop a wider war He said there’s genuine goodwill and desire among nations to work with India. “We see a sentiment overall for India to succeed,” Jaishankar said Indian consulate in Australia to be inaugurated in Brisbane by Jaishankar 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 12 injured as terrorists lob grenade on Srinagar crowd CRPF vehicle was the target; L-G asks forces to crush terror outfits F AYA Z W A N I @ New Delhi A day after Srinagar witnessed the first encounter in two years, militants on Sunday carried out a grenade attack at the crowded flea market in the city , injuring 12 people, including two women. The condition of one person is critical. After the attack, Lt Governor Manoj Sinha directed security officials to use full force and crush the terror outfits. Sources said militants lobbed a grenade towards a vehicle of paramilitary CRPF at Sunday Market near Tourist Reception Centre. The attack happened in the afternoon when the place was crowded with people thronging the flea market to buy woollens and other items. “The grenade missed the intended target and exploded on a road. It caused splinter injuries to those present on the spot,” a police official said. The injured were evacuated to nearby SMHS hospital, where doctors attended to them. Medical Superintendent Dr Tasneem Showkat told this newspaper that of one the injured is in critical condition while the rest are stable. The grenade attack caused panic in the area with the people running helter-skelter. The grenade attack took place a day after an encounter Will implement UCC, tribals to be exempt: Shah M U K E S H R A N J A N @ Ranchi Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Sunday that the BJP will implement the Unifor m Civil Code (UCC) in Jharkhand if it wins the upcoming Assembly elections in the state, but would keep the tribals out of the law’s ambit. “Uniform Civil Code will definitely be introduced in Jharkhand, but the tribal community will be kept out of its ambit,” Shah said. “They (The Jharkhand Mukti Morcha and the Congress) are spreading rumours that if the UCC is intro- them.“If the BJP forms government, we will make a law to return the land to the innocent tribals of Jharkhand,” Shah said. Training his guns on Soren, Shah said the chief minister insulted Champai Soren by unceremoniously removing him from the post of CM to satisfy his lust for power. Reacting to Shah’s promise to implement the UCC, Soren vowed that neither the UCC nor the National Registry of Citizens will be implement- Winter session likely from Nov 25, Centre may introduce Waqf bill Forensic team collects samples from the attack site in Srinagar on Sunday | PTI P R E E T H A N A I R @ New Delhi in Khyanyar area of Srinagar in which a top Lashkar commander was killed. There has been a surge in militant violence and attacks in Jammu and Kashmir after the civilian government led by Omar Abdullah took charge as chief minister on October 16. THE winter session of Parliament is likely to commence on November 25 and will continue until December 20, according to sources. During the session, the government will introduce the contentious One Nation One Election and Waqf bills. The results of the Jharkhand and Maharashtra assembly elections, which will come on November 23, will also have a significant bearing on the session. Still smarting from the Haryana defeat, the Congress and its allies in the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) are pinning their J&K Assembly session starts today The legislative assembly of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir will meet for a five-day session on Monday. NC leader Abdul Rahim Rather is set to be the speaker “The last few days have been dominated by headlines of attacks and encounters in parts of the Valley Today’s news of a . grenade attack on innocent shoppers... is deeply disturbing. There can be no justification for targeting innocent civilians,” Omar Abdullah said. Lt Governor Manoj Sinha spoke to DGP Nalin Prabhat and senior security officials. “Terrorists targeting citizens will have to pay a very heavy price for their actions. You have full freedom to crush terror outfits and leave no stone unturned to complete this mission,” Sinha told the senior security officials. hopes on wresting power in Maharashtra while retaining the Hemant Soren-led government in Jharkhand. The results will dominate the tone and tenor of the session. Sources said the government may also pass a resolution to grant full statehood to Jammu and Kashmir, a crucial step towards reinstating constitutional rights and safeguarding the unique identity of the region’s residents. Recently, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union home minister Amit Shah to discuss the issues related to the Union Territory in, cluding early restoration of statehood. According to sources, a special joint sitting of both Houses of Parliament will be held on November 26 to mark the 75th anniversary of adopting the Constitution of India. The joint sitting of the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha is likely to be held in the Central Hall of the Samvidhan Sadan, where the Constituent Assembly adopted the Constitution on November 26, 1949, and it came into effect on January 26, 1950. If the government introduces the One Nation, One Election Bill in Parliament, it will face stiff resistance as several opposition-ruled states are opposed to the proposal, saying it is against the Constitution. Aminjikarai murder: Cops arrest 6, invoke Pocso Act ‘Poor law and order’: TVK flays DMK EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Chennai EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Chennai A week after tacitly identifying the DMK as its political foe and BJP as its ideological opponent at the Vikravandi conference, actor Vijay’s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) on Sunday launched a direct attack on the Dravidian party, alleging that law and order has deteriorated in Tamil Nadu and that the state government focusses solely on the welfare of a select few. The party also condemned “personal attacks” by the DMKled government on opposition leaders and critics in online and offline platforms. The TVK’s executive committee meeting, chaired by party chief Vijay in Panaiyur near Chennai on Sunday, passed 26 resolutions. The party attributed the surge in crimes to the ruling party’s failure to control law and order. The party accused the state government of neglecting public welfare and alleged that instead of addressing issues like the sale of illicit liquor and rising drug addiction among the youth, the administration is prioritising the interests of a few individuals. The TVK said education and health should be shifted to States’ control, which would allow TN to exempt medical admissions from the NEET. The committee also condemned the DMK-led government for recent hikes in electricity tariffs, milk prices, and property taxes, arguing that no revenue-boosting measures had been implemented. Further, it said the electricity billing cycle should be made monthly instead of bimonthly . Condemning the BJP-led centre, the TVK said neither the centre nor its representative (Governor) has any right to interfere in matters related to the Tamil language. P5 duced in the state, the art and culture of the tribal population will be ruined,” he said. Releasing the BJP’s manifesto, ‘Sankalp Patra’, for the upcoming elections in Jharkhand, Shah alleged that the JMM-led state government has failed to protect the tribal land from ‘intruders’. He said if the BJP forms gover nment in the state, it will bring laws to prevent the transfer of tribal land to infiltrators and take back the land already g rabbed by RUSH season People wait for trains to reach their hometowns ahead of the Chhath Puja festival, at New Delhi railway station, on Sunday | PTI express read Convocations for 19 state universities completed by October: Raj Bhavan Lawrence Bishnoi’s brother booked for threatening Bhim Sena chief Chennai: In a first, convocations for 19 of the 20 state universities were completed by October, said the Raj Bhavan on Sunday. The convocation for Tamil Nadu Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, upon the university’s request, has been scheduled for November 20. Across the 19 universities, 8,27,990 students received degrees | P4 Gurugram: The police have booked Anmol Bishnoi, brother of gangster Lawrence Bishnoi, for allegedly making threatening calls to Bhim Sena chief Satpal Tanwar from abroad, an officer said. According to the complaint, Bhim Sena chief received several phone calls from Anmol on October 30 with the threat that he would cut him in pieces Aminjikarai police on Sunday arrested six persons, including four women, in connection with the death of a 15-year-old girl at an apartment. A day after the girl’s death came to light, police registered a case of murder against the six and have also invoked sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. While police had initially ruled out sexual assault in the case, sources said that Sections 5 and 6 of POCSO, pertaining to aggravated penetrative sexual assault, had been invoked as an object might have been used to violate the child as a “form of punishment”. The girl’s body was found with burn injuries, police had said on Saturday . “During an inquiry, one of the arrested women confessed to violating the girl with an object to teach her a lesson. That was the reason for invoking the POCSO Act,” a senior police officer told TNIE. Police are still awaiting autopsy results. The suspects arrested are Nivetha alias Nasiya (30), her husband Mohammad Nishath (36), the couple’s friends Lokesh (26) and his wife Jayasakthi (24), their domestic worker Maheshwari (40), and Nishath’s sister Seema Begum (39). Following police inquiry, all six suspects were sent for judicial remand. The police said the victim, who hailed from Thanjavur, had been working at the couple’s rented house in an apartment complex in Aminjikarai since December 2023 to take care of their six-year-old child. Based on the house owner’s complaint on Friday the police , registered a case of unnatural death which was altered after the inquiry . P5 ed in the state. Senior BJP leaders including Jharkhand election in-charge Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Assam Chief Minister and co-election in-charge Himanta Biswa Sarma attended the function to launch the ‘Sankalp Patra’. Shah said the BJP will launch ‘GoGo Didi Yojna’ in the state if elected. Under the scheme, `2100 will be transferred to poor women on the 11th day of every month. Besides, free LPG cylinders will be given to poor households on Diwali and Raksha Bandhan, he said.  P8 at a snail’s pace Court pulls up TN police over delay in probe in two cases EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Madurai Displeased with the state police for their delay in completing investigation in two separate cases, one of which was a hit-and-run case, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court recently criticised that if not for the victim’s situation, it would have permitted her to investigate the case along with the police. “The state is the prosecuting agency and every victim of a crime depends upon it. If the police are not carrying out a proper investigation, the victims may not get a remedy ob,” served Justice B Pugalendhi, while passing two separate orders in petitions seeking expeditious investigations. The first petition was filed by S Kamala, who had lost her husband in a hit-and-run eight months ago and the police are yet to identify the vehicle involved. The judge pointed out that as per Section 2(h) of the CrPC and Section 2(j) of the BNSS, the power of investigation is vested not only with a police officer but also with anyone authorised by a magistrate. But he said he refrained from permitting Kamala to conduct the probe along with the police, considering she is a young widow with two children. He therefore suo motu impleaded the Dindigul superintendent of police as a party to the case and directed the officer to ensure the vehicle involved is identified and further action is taken within two weeks. The judge made similar observations in a petition filed by R Kanimozhi in a burglary case registered in 2022. Though jewellery worth `6.6 lakh was reported to have been stolen, the judge said the police have neither found the suspect nor the jewellery . P5 humiliation at home Gone with the spin in less than 10 days: Why India crumbled G o mesh S @ Mumbai INDIA did not have any tangible answer to New Zealand’s, what seemed like, an infinite variety of cricket. If the hosts perished to some immaculate pace bowling under overcast conditions, almost England– like in Bengaluru, and later, on turning tracks in Pune and Mumbai, the batters scratched their heads like students struggling to find solutions to multiple problems. Only Risabh Pant stood among the ruins. The ending seemed inevitable on Sunday. After all, for the nine days of cricket India and New Zealand have had in this series, the visitors outperformed India in almost every single one. The tenth day (of the three-Test series) was no different either as New Zealand became the first team to beat India in three consecutive Tests at home. While Tom Latham’s side was spot on in every move, captain Rohit Sharma’s every move seemed to have backfired. He admitted as much after the loss here. “Something like this will be a low point in my career. I fully take responsibility for that as a 92 New Zealand’s Ajaz Patel (3L) and Devon Conway (L) shake hands with India’s Virat Kohli (2R) and captain Rohit Sharma (2L). Ravindra Jadeja is also seen in the picture (extreme right) | AFp India have been clean swept in a Test series at home (3 matches or more) for the first time in 92 years of their history captain. I have not been at the best of my abilities right from the start of the series. With the bat, I have not been good enough,” Sharma said. It all began in Bengaluru when Sharma misread the pitch and opted to bat. The chances of recovery were slim after the 46 all out in the first innings. In search of a win, India opted for a surface that would assist spinners in Pune. However, it was Mitchell Santner who outfoxed the host batters. The second Test loss exposed the struggles of the most experienced batters against spin. In Mumbai, on another rank turner, India went into self-destruct mode. On Sunday, too, the collapse began with Sharma’s miscued pull against Matt Henry. They slumped to 29/5 and eventually fell short by 25 runs while chasing 147. India are in transition where the seniors, including Sharma, Virat Kohli, Ravindra Jadeja and R Ashwin, are in the November of their careers. India’s last home series defeat came 12 years ago. The dominance that followed and the fall in the last three weeks would make this one of the lowest phases in the history of Indian cricket.