MADURAI l friday l may 30, 2025 l `9.00 l PAGES 14 l LATE CITY EDITION U.S. trade court strikes down Trump’s reciprocal tariffs In a big blow to US prez Donald Trump, the Court of International Trade blocked most of his tariffs after finding that he overstepped his authority Trump administration files appeal President exceeded his authority: Judges The ruling was given by a three-judge panel of the New York-based federal court. The Trump administration disagreed with the ruling and filed an appeal to the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Washington. The federal court has jurisdiction over civil cases involving trade. Its rulings can be appealed to the US Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court ■ ■ The ruling strikes down Trump’s blanket tariff orders since January using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a law meant to address threats during a national emergency The federal court held that by announcing sweeping tariffs, the US president exceeded his authority to regulate imports under IEEPA 10 days Time given by court to White House to finish the paper work to halt tariffs 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 Tharoor calls his Air Chief’s plainspeak on delays PMK rift widens; critics ‘zealots’ in defence acquisition timelines Ramadoss slams son, blames him Family feud Says at times deals are signed knowing full well that delivery schedule would not be met MAYANK S INGH @ New Delhi Air Chief Marshal A P Singh on Thursday did some plainspeak on the inordinate delays in defence acquisition, saying sometimes deals are signed knowing full well that the promised delivery timelines would not be met. “Why should we promise something which cannot be achieved?” he wondered while addressing the CII Annual Business Summit 2025. “While signing the contract itself sometimes we are sure that it is not going to come up, but we just sign the contract. Uske baad dekhenge kya karna hai (We will later see what is to be done). Obviously then the process gets vitiated.” He added that there was not a single Opening AMCA for pvt sector very big step Lauding the inclusion of private players in the development of Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) as a very big step, the Air Chief said, “I’m sure this will pave the way for bigger things in future.” Over the next 10 years, we will see more results from the domestic defence industry and DRDO. But what we need today is required today. Act quickly, maybe fast-track Make-in-India programmes project he could think of that had been completed on time. The IAF’s lethal firepower brought Pakistan to its knees in the recent four-day war as part of Operation Sindoor to avenge the Pahalgam terror attack. This was despite delays in new inductions, which are per- RBI annual report Bank fraud cases down, but value up 3-fold in FY25 D i pa k M o n d a l @ New Delhi Netting livelihood Fisherfolk repairing nets at Kasimedu fishing harbour in Chennai | P Jawahar express read TN constitutes seventh Finance Commission Culture ministry clarifies on Keezhadi report row Chennai: TN government has constituted the Seventh State Finance Commission under retired IAS officer K Allaudin. The panel’s recommendations will be for a five-year period starting from April 1, 2027 Chennai: After ASI’s request to archaeologist K Amarnath Ramakrishna to resubmit his Keezhadi report sparked a row, union culture ministry refuted the charge of ASI being uninterested in publishing the report SC vacancies filled with appointment of 3 judges New Delhi: Karnataka High Court Chief Justice N V Anjaria, Gauhati High Court Chief Justice Vijay Bishnoi, and Bombay High Court judge Justice A S Chandurkar were appointed to the Supreme Court on Thursday. Once they take oath, the apex court will regain its full working strength of 34 judges, including Chief Justice of India B R Gavai | P7 DESPITE a decline in the number of reported bank frauds in 2024-25, the total value involved in these frauds almost trebled compared with the previous year, according to the Reserve Bank of India’s annual report. The increase is attributed to the reclassification and fresh reporting of earlier cases following a Supreme Court ruling on due process. A total of 23,953 frauds were reported during the year, down from 36,060 in 2023-24. However, the amount involved jumped sharply to `36,014 crore, up from `12,230 crore. This surge is primarily due to the reinstatement of 122 previously withdrawn cases amounting to `18,674 crore, after re-examination in line with the Supreme Court’s March 2023 judgment mandating adherence to the principles of natural justice before designating frauds. While private sector banks accounted for the highest number of frauds—14,233 cases—their share in the total amount was only 28%, RBI’s annual report showed. In contrast, public sector banks, with 6,935 cases of fraud, were responsible for 71% of the value involved, reflecting the larger size and complexity of their loan books. Foreign banks, small finance banks, and payment banks together made up less than 1% of the total fraud value. Loan-related frauds accounted for 92% of the value. Digital payment frauds (card/internet) comprised 56.5% of the total cases. For 2025-26, the RBI plans to roll out realtime digital dashboards to monitor frauds and digital service uptime, enhance cyber resilience in financial entities, and issue fresh guidelines on digital forensic readiness. Three killed in road accident near Nagore E x p r e ss N e w s S e r v i c e @ Nagapattinam Three people died and one suffered injuries in road accident involcing multiple vehicles on East Coast Road near Nagore on Thursday. The deceased were identified as S Anandaraj (24) of Nagapattinam, J Karthi (33) of Chennai and Vinoth Babu (27) of Koothur. Police said two people succumbed to injuries they suffered following a collision between two bikes, and a pillion rider of one of the bikes was run over by a speeding truck when he was trying to get up after the collision. According to sources, S Anandaraj of Jaganathapuram in Nagapattinam along with J Motorists riding past the accident site on Azhiyur branch road | EXPRESS Karthi of Chennai were riding on a bike from Nagore to Nagapattinam. When they were near the Azhiyur branch road, a bike coming from the branch road rammed into their vehi- cle. In the impact, Anandaraj, and Karthi fell on the road. Vinoth Babu (27) and his wife Sindhubairavi (23) of Vannankulam in Koothur, who were riding the other bike, also fell down. Even as they were trying to recover from the fall, a truck proceeding from Nagore to Nagapattinam knocked Karthi down killing him on the spot. Vinoth Babu also died on the spot due to injuries suffered in the collision. Anandaraj and Sindhubairavi were taken to Nagapattinam GH in ambulance but doctors declared Anandaraj dead. Sindhubairavi been admitted in the intensive care unit of the hospital. Nagore police registered a case and were investigating the truck driver. Victims fell off bikes S Anandaraj, his friend J Karthi, Vinoth Babu and his wife Sindhubairavi fell down after their bikes collided. Even as Karthi was trying to get up, a speeding truck hit him fatally. Vinoth Babu died of injuries. Anandaraj died in hospital Part two taken place in recent years alone, during which previous A fresh war of words erupted Indian responses were both rebetween Congress MP Shashi strained and constrained by Tharoor and his party col- our responsible respect for the leagues on Thursday, under- LoC and the IB (international scoring the growing rift be- border).” tween them. After facing However, his clarification backlash for his remarks on the failed to broker peace. With a surgical strike by Indisection of party leaders an forces in 2016 by continuing their offenbreaching the Line of sive against Tharoor, Control (LoC), termed another party leader his censurers ‘zealots’. Randeep Surjewala had In response to the to step in to defuse the criticism, Tharoor took situation. He said that to social media to clarithe Kerala leader is part fy his comments. of the Congress family “For those zealots fulthough his remark was minating about my supincorrect. I was clearly posed ignorance of In- speaking about Tharoor is heading a dian valour across the multi-party delegation reprisals for terrorist LoC: in the past.. I was to five countries. While attacks and clearly and explicitly speaking in Panama, he about not speaking only about rereportedly said that Inprisals for terrorist at- previous wars dia breached the LoC tacks and not about prefor the first time in 2016. Shashi Tharoor vious wars;… But as Taking a swipe at this usual, critics and trolls are wel- statement, Congress spokescome to distort my views and person Udit Raj said Tharoor words as they see fit. I genuine- should be made a “super ly have better things to do,” he spokesperson of the BJP”. said. Meanwhile, many BJP leadSeeking to explain further, ers including Union minister Tharoor wrote: “My remarks Kiren Rijiju came in support of were preceded by a reference to Tharoor, questioning Conthe several attacks that have gress’ motives. PARVE Z S U LTAN @ New Delhi ennial in the IAF. Its combat strength is not just dwindling, many of its fighter aircraft are reaching obsolescence. While its sanctioned strength of combat squadrons is 42, the actual strength hovers around 30, with each of them having around 18 aircraft. For example, Hindustan Aeronautics had assured it would begin delivery of 24 Tejas MKIA jets in February 2024. However, not one of them has been delivered yet. “Deliveries of Tejas MK-IA are delayed. The prototype of Tejas MK-2 is yet to roll out. There is no prototype yet of the stealth Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) fighter,” Air Chief Singh said. He had in March flagged the issue of the “badly off ” numbers of fighter aircraft in the force. While it will take time to fill the existing gap, he said he would favour indigenous jets. “Even if a domestic system delivers 85% or 90% of the performance offered by international products, we will go with the homegrown option.” near-dystopian situation in bangladesh The Yunus govt has pushed people into agitation mode and the country into a near dystopian situation, reports senior journalist Monideepa Banerji | P9 for alliance fiasco E x p r e ss N e ws S e r v i c e @ Villupuram In a scathing attack that widened the rift between the father and son in the PMK, party founder Dr S Ramadoss on Thursday said making his son Dr Anbumani Ramadoss a union minister in 2004 was a big mistake. Ramadoss accused his son of sabotaging party unity and discipline, lacking leadership qualities, and even acting viDr S Ramadoss olently once towards his mother. He also blamed Anbumani for PMK aligning with the BJP instead of AIADMK, in , the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Ramadoss said the only way for reconciliation is for Anbumani to accept the role of “executive president” while he remains the president. While Anbumani’s camp remained silent, sources said he will hold a consultative meet with cadres from May 30-June 1 at a private hall in Sholinganallur.  P7