DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PUNE, VADODARA ● REG.NO. MCS/067/2018 - 20 RNI REGN. NO. 1543/57 JOURNALISM OF COURAGE FRIDAY, MAY 6, 2022, MUMBAI, LATE CITY, 14 PAGES `5.00, WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM SINCE 1932 7 ADDITIONAL SEATS: JAMMU GETS 6, KASHMIR 1 THE ANTI-Corruption Bureau (ACB) of Maharashtra Police has registeredanFIRagainstJitendra ‘Jitu’ Navlani (72) for allegedly collecting nearly Rs 59 crore from several businessmen by claimingtobeworkingatthebehest of Enforcement Directorate (ED) officers. Earlier, Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut had alleged that Navlani, along with three officials of the ED, was running an "extortion racket" targetting certain businessman and offering them “protectionfromEDinquiries”in lieu of money. Raut had alleged that they had extorted over Rs 100 crore from builders and corporate houses in Mumbai. Navlani is also reportedly an aide of former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh. Mumbai Police had formed a specialinvestigationteamledby IPS officer Viresh Prabhu to investigate the allegations after a written complaint was submitted by Shiv Sena party worker Arvind Bhosle in March. CONTINUEDONPAGE2 THE CITY ‘HARASSED BY LOANRECOVERY AGENTS’,MAN DIES BY SUICIDE PAGE 3 BUSINESS AS USUAL BY UNNY FINALISING ITS order for the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, the Delimitation Commission Thursday recommended seven additional constituencies — six for Jammu and one for Kashmir — taking the total number of seats in the UT to The delimitation panel in Srinagar on Thursday. ANI 90 from 83 earlier. This will increasethenumberof seatsinthe CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 PAGE 10 SREENIVAS JANYALA HYDERABAD, MAY 5 A HINDU-MUSLIM couple was attacked at a busy crossing in Hyderabad Wednesday night, allegedly by the woman’s relatives, who hacked her husband to death. Police have arrested two of the woman’s relatives while her brother and another relative, who allegedly carried out the attack, are absconding. B Nagaraju, 25, and his wife Ashrin Sultana, 23, were on a motorcycle when around 8.45 pm, they were waylaid near Mandal Revenue Office at Saroornagar in Hyderabad by two men who attacked them with an iron rod. As the couple fell to the ground, the attackers took out a knife and stabbed ANANTHAKRISHNAN G NEW DELHI, MAY 5 A video grab of Ashrin trying to stop her brother Mubin Syed who attacked her husband Nagaraju and is now absconding Nagarajumultiple times, leaving him dead. His wife Ashrin, who was rushed to a hospital by passersby, is reportedly stable. KOREGAON BHIMA INQUIRY COMMISSION Pawar appears before panel, skips questions on Bhide and Ekbote WHILE DEPOSING as a witness before the Koregaon Bhima Commission of Inquiry on Thursday, NCP chief Sharad Pawar steered clear of making any specific allegations against Hindutva leaders Milind Ekbote and Sambhaji Bhide. The two-member commission headed by retired justice J N Patel is probing into the causes of violence in Koregaon Bhima area of Pune on January 1, 2018, in which one person had died and many others were left injured. Speaking to mediapersons after the violence, Pawar had raised suspicion about the role of Hindutva groups in the violence. Also, in his press conference held in February 2020, Pawar had made allegations against Ekbote and Bhide. But during his cross examination by advocate B G Bansode, NCP chief Sharad Pawar representing a Dalit witness, Tukaram Gaware, Pawar said that he did not know Bhide and Ekbote andhad“only readabout them through media.” When Bansode asked him another question regarding the duo,Pawar said,“Iamrestricting myself to the facts stated in my affidavit before the Commission of Inquiry.” In his additional affidavit filedbeforethepanellastmonth, Pawarhadstatedthathehad“no personalknowledgeorinformation about the sequence of events” leading to the violence. Pawar had, in his first affidavit filed before the commission in October 2018, stated that CONTINUEDONPAGE2 CCTVfootagereleasedbypolice shows Ashrin fighting off a man in a blue shirt, whom she CONTINUEDONPAGE2 LYNCHING OF TWO TRIBALS IN MP Families of six held say accused linked to Bajrang Dal ANAND MOHAN J SEONI (MP), MAY 5 AT LEAST six of the 13 persons arrested for the death of two tribal men, who were assaulted on Tuesday over allegations of cow slaughter in Madhya Pradesh’s Seoni, are members of the Bajrang Dal — and had allegedly participated in previous “raids against cattle smugglers”, their family members told The Indian Express. The families of some of the six others arrested claimed they were cajoled into joining the raid, which led to the deaths, by people they met at a local wedding. Another accused is a tribal youth whose family does “not know much” about the case. The local court in Seoni has sent the 13 accused to judicial custody. SP (Seoni) Kumar Prateek said the police have not CONTINUEDONPAGE2 Teen athletics star sparks buzz with top numbers on biomechanics chart PAGE 1 ANCHOR ANDREW AMSAN NEW DELHI, MAY 5 PRIYA MOHAN HAD a go at singing,dancing,playingthekeyboard,evenpainting.“Itriedthem all out because my parents wanted me to, but my first and only love has been athletics,” she says. Today, the 19-year-old is the centre of a rising buzz in Indian athletics. Not just because she beat India's fastest runner Dutee Chandfourdaysago.Sheisbeing hailed as a potential world-class athlete, with incredible musclelevers, by biomechanicsexperts. OPPOSINGTHEfinaldelimitation order on Thursday, both the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and People’s Conference called it an attempt to “disempower” the people of Kashmir, while the Congress said it was “biased and motivated”. The National Conference (NC) said it was “studying CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 2020-21 -2 171 140 187 52 Excess mortality is difference between total deaths & deaths expected in absence of Covid. Source: WHO tries separately. For India, the WHO said about 8.3 lakh deaths are CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Over 90% deaths went unreported? Why WHO norms against law misuse data raises questions MUMBAI, MAY 5 UKRAINE: MODI AND MACRON DISCUSS EACH OTHER’S STAND SRINAGAR, JAMMU, MAY 5 the implications” of the order. “We outrightly reject it,” said PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti. She said the Delimitation Commissionhad“overlookedthebasisof populationandactedaspertheir wish...Wedon’ttrustit.Itsrecommendations are a link to abrogation of Article 370 — how to disempower people of J&K.” "The PDP, from Day 1, has maintained that the DelimitationCommission,eventhough Country China India USA Indonesia Pakistan In Hyderabad, man hacked to death Sedition: SC explores by wife kin over interfaith wedding larger bench, AG for CHANDAN HAYGUNDE EXPRESS NETWORK EXPLAINED,PAGE9 NAVEED IQBAL & ARUN SHARMA In 5 most populous countries, per 100,000 population Priya Mohan beat Dutee Chand recently “At our centre, we have tested more than 2000 elite athletes, but her readings are way better than any athlete who has walked in here,” says Anthony Chacko, director of the Karnataka state-run Centre for Sports Science (CSS). “Her torque (strength and force generated by the legs and muscles around the thoracic spine) is about 480 Newton metres while most elite athletes we tested were in the 280 Nm region. She is blessed with an incredible recovery rate. If she stays injury-free, she has the potential to become a world-class athlete,” says Chacko. AlongwithPriya'scoachArun Ajay, experts at the centre predict “great scope of improvement” for someone who started the season clocking 52.37s in 400m -- and will soon be within striking distance of the national mark of 50.79s. Last year, Priya clocked 52.77s, which got her to a close CONTINUEDONPAGE2 HEARINGPETITIONSchallenging the constitutional validity of Indian Penal Code Section 124A dealing with sedition, the SupremeCourtdecidedThursday tofirst examineif itshouldbereferredtoalargerbenchinlightof its1962judgmentupholdingthe provisionafterreadingitdown.It will hear detailed arguments on May 10 on whether the matter should be referred. Contendingthattherulingby a five-judge Constitution bench in Kedar Nath Singh vs State of Bihar was a “very well balanced judgment” and need not be referredtoalargerbench,Attorney General K K Venugopal said Section 124A should be retained andonlyguidelinesbelaiddown to prevent its misuse. Venugopal is assisting the court in the matter in his capacityasAttorneyGeneralwhilethe Centralgovernmentisbeingrepresented by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta. Venugopal referred to the recent row over Hanuman Chalisa in Maharashtra wherein CONTINUEDONPAGE2 AMITABH SINHA PUNE, MAY 5 WHILE there is little doubt that India’s official Covid-19 death toll is an undercount, as is the case with probably most other countries, the “excessmortality” figures released by the World Health Organisation Thursday raise several questions. The WHO’s estimate of 47.4 lakh Covid-related deaths in India in 2020 and 2021 flies in the face of overall death data, historicaltrendsindeathreporting, and Covid death CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 GOVT’S DEATH DATA ■ Estimated ■ Registered ■ Registrationincrease overpreviousyear REGISTRATION(%) 84.60 92.00 2018 2019 99.90 81,15,882 MUMBAI, MAY 5 NEW DELHI, SRINAGAR, JAMMU, MAY 5 WITH THE final order now notified, all eyes will be on the EC and the Union government regarding the timing of Assembly elections. Though mainstream parties in the Valley have criticised the report, it is likely that this will make space for political engagement in the UT. COVID COULD have killed as manyas47.4lakhpeopleinIndia in 2020 and 2021, either directly duetoinfectionorthroughitsindirect impact, the World Health Organisation said on Thursday. The figure, disputed by India, is nearlytentimesthecountry’sofficialCoviddeathtollof 4.81lakh at the end of 2021. In its report on excess deaths due to Covid, WHO said that an estimated 1.5 crore people are likely to have succumbed to the direct or indirect impact of the disease globally during the first two years of the pandemic — instead of the 54 lakh that have beenrecordedofficiallybycoun- 81,20,268 EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE ANISHA DUTTA, BASHAARAT MASOOD & ARUN SHARMA E Disempowers, biased: J&K parties oppose panel order EXCESS MORTALITY 83,01,769 Accused by Raut of running extortion racket with ED officials, 72-yr-old man booked by ACB Next step: Assembly ● polls NEW DELHI, MAY 5 76,41,076 ` 50 per Dozen Each of the five LS constituencies will comprise 18 Assembly seats ANONNA DUTT 69,50,607 ` 183 per kilo 82,12,576 ` 147 per kilo Delimitation panel releases final order: Jammu gets 43 seats and Kashmir 47 E X P L A I NE D ` 119 per kilo WHO: 47.4 lakh India Covid deaths, nearly 10 times official count 2020 4,86,828 6,90,469 4,74,806 Source: PIB