DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PUNE, VADODARA JOURNALISM OF COURAGE TUESDAY, APRIL 19, 2022, NEW DELHI, LATE CITY, 18 PAGES Get guidance for UPSC CSE from Eminent Bureaucrats and Top Educators Strategy and Guidance Workshop Special Session by Gaurav Kaushal | IDES 2014-22 WITH COVID-19 cases rising again, the Uttar Pradesh and Haryana governments on Monday made masks mandatory in the districts surrounding Delhi. The Delhi Disaster ManagementAuthority(DDMA) is also likely to discuss the mandatory use of masks in the capital at its meeting on Wednesday. Delhi, UP and Haryana scrapped the fine for not wearing masks in public in the first week of April. InUP,maskshavebeenmade mandatory in Gautam Buddha Nagar, Ghaziabad, Hapur, Meerut, Bulandshahr and Baghpat. Most of the new cases reported in the state on Sunday were from two of these districts. While 76 new cases were reported from Gautam Buddha Nagar, 33 were from Ghaziabad, 7 from Lucknow, 2 each from Meerut and Bulandshahr, and one from Baghpat on Sunday. Growing concern as wholesale inflation up to 14.55%, pressure on retail prices Trend reversal with CPI inflation converging towards WPI inflation a worry AANCHAL MAGAZINE & PRANAV MUKUL NEW DELHI, APRIL 18 WITH PRICES of crude oil and other commodities rising due to disruptions in global supply chainsin the wake of the RussiaUkraine war, the Wholesale Price Index or WPI-based inflation surged to 14.55 per cent in March 2022, after a 13.11 per cent reading in February 2022. ThisisthesecondhighestWPI printinthe2011-12series.Theannual WPI inflation — inflation at theproducerlevel—hasremained in the double—digits in every monthof2021-22andhasalmost consistentlyedgedupwards. For policymakers, a more worrying prospect is that of the Consumer Price Index or CPIbased annual inflation — inflationatthe retaillevel — converging towards the WPI-based inflation, in deviation from the usual trend of the wholesale price inflation collapsing in the direction of the retail price rise. It presents a peculiar challenge for policymakers: the gap betweenthetwometricscontinuing for an extended period points to lingering market inefficiencies,triggered,inpart,bythe Covid-inducedimpactattheproducer level. Secondly, the rise in CPI inflation, with no cooling off insight,indicatesashiftfromthe historicaltrendwherethewholesale inflation typically collapses towards consumer inflation. Ahead of the wholesale price-based inflation spiking to a four-month high of 14.55 per centinMarch,ahighbaseof 7.89 percentinMarch2021 notwithstanding,datareleasedlastweek showed retail inflation in March had surged to a 17-month high of 6.95percent,drivenprimarily by high prices of fuels and food itemssuchascereals,vegetables, milk, oils, meat, and fish. Economists are worried. “You are in a situation where the pricing power has increased in CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 E E X P L A I NE D NEW DELHI, APRIL 18 Scan QR code to enroll Live on April 19 & 20 5 PM onwards Covid cases up, WPI HAS BEEN IN DOUBLE DIGITS EVERY MONTH IN 2021-22 UP & Haryana make masks must in dists next to Delhi EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE `6.00 (`8 BIHAR & RAIPUR, `12 SRINAGAR) WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM SINCE 1932 Why the spike and ● the worry THE SMALL and medium sector bore the brunt of the pandemic. The pricing power has shifted substantially to larger enterprises. The cost push increases showing up in the WPI will likely influence the financial crisis, a worry going forward. PM’s Red Fort address to mark birth anniv of Guru Tegh Bahadur CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 THE WORLD To address nation on April 21 DIVYA A RUSSIA STRIKES LVIV, PREPARES FOR ASSAULT IN EAST P 14 GOING TO SCHOOL IN JAHANGIRPURI Security personnel in Delhi’s Jahangirpuri on Monday, two days after communal clashes. Praveen Khanna LAKHIMPUR KHERI CASE SC sets aside HC bail order, tells Ashish Mishra to surrender EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE NEW DELHI, APRIL 18 THE SUPREME Court on Monday set aside the Allahabad High Court’s order granting bail to Ashish Mishra, son of Union Minister of State (Home) Ajay Kumar Mishra, in the Lakhimpur Kheri case and asked him to surrender within a week. The court said the HC had “adopted a myopic view of the evidence” and denied “a fair and effective hearing” to the “victims”. The bench of Chief Justice of India N V Ramana and Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli asked the HC to decide the bail plea afresh, “in a fair, impartial and dispassionate manner, and keeping in view the settled pa- NEW DELHI, APRIL 18 BUSINESS AS USUAL BY UNNY REPORT,PAGE4 Lt Gen Manoj Pande named new Army chief, first from Corps of Engineers DEEPTIMAN TIWARY NEW DELHI, APRIL 18 LIEUTENANT GENERAL Manoj Pande was Monday appointed the new Chief of Army Staff. He will succeed General M M Naravane on May 1. The Vice Chief of Army Staff, Lt General Pande will be the first He will take charge on May 1 officer from the Corps of Engineers to become the COAS. In a Twitter post, the Indian Army said: “General MM Naravane #COAS & All Ranks of #IndianArmy congratulate LieutenantGeneralManojPande #VCOAS on being appointed as the 29th Chief of the Army Staff #COAS of the #IndianArmy. Lt Gen Manoj Pande will assume theappointmentof #COASon01 May 2022.” CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 PRIMEMINISTERNarendraModi willaddressthenationfromRed Fort on April 21, to mark the 400th birth anniversary of Guru Tegh Bahadur, the ninth Sikh Guru, the Union Ministry of Culture said on Monday. The PM’s address will mark the culmination of a two-day mega event being organised by the ministry at Red Fort, in collaboration with the Delhi Sikh GurdwaraManagementCommittee, Union Culture Minister G Kishan Reddysaid. In his speech, which is expected around 9:30 pm after ‘shabad kirtan’ by 400 ragis (Sikh musicians), the PM is likely to focus on relaying a message of interfaith peace, said sources. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Shelters and sanctuaries to biogas and cow dung, UP govt readies a stray cattle plan MAULSHREE SETH LUCKNOW, APRIL 18 rameters... and after giving adequate opportunity of hearing to the victims as well”, preferably within three months. The bench was hearing petitions filed by the relatives of CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 A MONTH into his second term, Chief MinisterYogiAdityanathis set to unveil a plan to tackle the stray cattle menace. With the problem emerging as an issue during the Assembly polls, the BJP led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi had promised a solution if returned to power. The plan includes provisioning for shelters within 100 days to accommodate up to 50,000 stray cattle, going up to 1 lakh in six months; cow sanctuaries acrossthestatetohousecattlein anaturalhabitat;constructionof at least 50 mega cow shelters; and raising the capacity of exist- Stray cattle emerged as an issue during Assembly polls ing ones. Besides, each district magistrate has been given the target of ensuring shelter for at least 10 stray cows per day starting April 15. Officials said the idea is to plan long-term, rather than look for quick fixes as in the previous regime, after the stray cattle menace exploded following a CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 GUJARAT TO BENGAL TO DELHI Who runs cricket in India? In many cases, depends on who your father is Over a third of state units have sons in key posts in cricket administration NIHAL KOSHIE & DEVENDRA PANDEY NEW DELHI, APRIL 18 MAHANAARYAMAN SCINDIA, son of Union Minister for Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia, was appointed vice-president of the Gwalior Division Cricket Association early this month. At a time when dynasty isn’t exactly a badge of political honour and when cricket’s playing field looks more level than ever, this hardly raised any eyebrows. For, it was true to Indian cricketboard’sage-oldtradition: a sonfollowinghis influentialfather’s footsteps in cricket’s administration. Indeed, over a third of the 38 full members of the BCCI today include, at the top, sons or relatives of former officials and of powerful politicians — the highest-ever in the board’s history. “Never have there been so many associations thatare ruled by families,” said a veteran BCCI official on the condition of anonymity. This despite red flags waved by the Supreme Court-appointed RM Lodha Committee. Framing the new BCCI constitution way back in 2016, it had underlined: “In some states all members are from a few families or a single family, thereby perpetuating the control over cricket in the hands of a few.” It put an age cap, 70 years, and a three-yearcoolingoff after asixyear term for administrators thus setting the stage for some fatherstohandovertotheirsons. Consider: ■ JAY SHAH: BCCI secretary, Former Gujarat Cricket Association joint-secretary. Father: Amit Shah, former GCA president and Union Home Minister. ■ ARUN DHUMAL: BCCI treasurer; Brother: Anurag Thakur, former BCCI president & Union I&B and Youth Affairs & Sports minister. ■ MAHANAARYAMAN SCINDIA: Gwalior Division CricketAssociation(GDCA)vicepresident; Father: Jyotiraditya Scindia, former president, MP Cricket Association; president, Chambal Division Cricket Association. ■ DHANRAJ NATHWANI: Gujarat Cricket Association (GCA) vice-president; Father: Parimal Nathwani, former GCA vice-president. ■ PRANAV AMIN: Baroda Cricket Association (BCA) president; Father: Chirayu Amin, former BCA president and Ex-interim IPL chairman. ■ AJIT LELE: Baroda Cricket Association (BCA) secretary; Father:LateJaywantLele,former BCA & BCCI secretary. ■ JAYDEV SHAH: Saurashtra Cricket Association (SCA) president; Father:NiranjanShah,former SCA & BCCI secretary. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Body of Khargone’s missing man found, first death in clashes IRAM SIDDIQUE INDORE, APRIL 18 THE FIRST death in the April 10 communal clash in Khargone was recorded on Monday, with a body found after the violence identifiedasthatof IbraishKhan. The28-year-old,aresidentof Khargone’s Islampura, had been missing since the violence that erupted during a Ram Navmi procession. His family identified the body, which had been found by police at 1 am on April 11 just 300 metres from his house, as that of Khan on Monday. Police said they had found Khan, a father of an eight- month-old boy, injured and rushed him to the district government hospital, where he died. The unidentified body was later shifted to Indore’s M Y Hospital for post-mortem. The district administration hasannouncedanex-gratiaof Rs 4 lakh for Khan’s family, identifying him officially as the victim of the communal clash. Angry at police, Khan’s brother Ikhlak said: “When we began searching for him, we were told by his friends who were with Ibraish that day that he was hit by policemen and taken somewhere. We kept pleading to policemen, but no CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 In Jaffna waters, India sinks China bid, but an old net problem rises Sri Lankan fishermen say Indian trawlers destroying their livelihood, current crisis provides chance to reset ties EXPRESSIN SRILANKA NIRUPAMASUBRAMANIAN DELFT (JAFFNA), APRIL 18 IT IS here, on this island off the Jaffna peninsula in the Northern Province, where India has displaced China to sign a pact with the Sri Lankan government for a joint renewable energy project. Its 5,000 inhabitants, all fisherfolk, are unaware of the intense geopolitical jostling over their island and two others nearby, Nainatheevu and Analatheevu, that went on most of last year as Delhi successfully persuaded Colombo to cancel a project awarded to a Chinese company, and offered its own instead. What they do know is that they have to deal with Indian fishermenfromTamilNaduwho sailintothewatersaroundJaffna three days a week, destroy fishing nets of the local people, and themselves use “erratai madi” or double-foldnetstobottomtrawl the seabed. The Sri Lanka-India Memorandum of Understanding for the project was among several signed in March during the visit of External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, as Delhi extended a Delft lies just 45 km north-east of Tamil Nadu’s Rameswaram. Nirupama Subramanian helpinghandtoColomboduring the economic crisis with financialassistanceworth$2.4billion. In Jaffna, Delhi is being urged to resolve the long-running fishing crisis, and view the opportunity presented by Sri Lanka’s crisis not through an India vs China lens, but as a chance to reset its engagementwithSriLankawith people-friendlyprojects,including in the Tamil areas. All of 50 sq km, Delft, also known by its Tamil name Neduntheevu, is located in the Palk Strait. A choppy one-hour boat ride from a Jaffna jetty called Kurikattuwan, Delft lies just 45 km north-east of Tamil Nadu’s Rameswaram. In between is Katchatheevu, which India ceded to Sri Lanka in 1974. Sri Lanka’s territorial waters in this entire area are a matter of severe contestation between IndianandSriLankanfishermen. “300 to 500 boats. They come at night on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays. Those are their fishing days, and they come that close,” said 42-year-old Regeeswaran, pointing to a buoy not far from the shore. His neighbour J Arokiyadas complained that when the Sri Lankan naval unit stationed on the island arrests Indian fishermentrespassinginthesewaters, “they get calls from the big guys in Colombo ordering their release”. IndiaandSriLankahavebeen engaged on the fishermen’s issue for nearly two decades, but have not beenableto resolve the matter. When the alarm bells went off in Delhi though in January CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 GOTABAYA PICKS NEW CABINET PAGE 14