DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PUNE, VADODARA JOURNALISM OF COURAGE FRIDAY, MARCH 14, 2025, AHMEDABAD, LATE CITY, 18 PAGES `5.00 ● WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM SINCE 1932 AMID WAR OF WORDS OVER LANGUAGE, DELIMITATION TN govt replaces rupee symbol with Tamil letter in state budget logo, draws Centre ire As DMK defends move, Sitharaman slams ‘mindset that weakens Indian unity, promotes secessionist sentiments’ NIKHILA HENRY HYDERABAD, MARCH 13 AMID ITS war of words with the Centre over the three-language policy under the National Education Policy, the DMK-led Tamil Nadu government Thursday dropped the Devanagari rupee symbol and replaced it with a Tamil letter in its logo for the state Budget 2025-26, which will be tabled Friday in the Assembly. The change in the TN Budget logo, posted on X by state BJP chief Annamalai. PTI This drew a sharp response fromthe BJP withUnion Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman callingita“completelyavoidable example of language and regional chauvinism”. Targeting the DMK, she said this “signals a dangerous mindset that weakens Indian unity and promotes secessionist sentiments under the pretence of regional pride”. The logo, released by the office of Chief Minister M K Stalin, which read ‘Ellorkkum Ellaam’ CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Centre must focus on North’s progress instead of threatening us: TN Minister EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE NEW DELHI, MARCH 13 WITHTHEDMKraisingthepitch against the Centre over impending delimitation and the National Education Policy (NEP), party leader and Tamil Nadu Minister for IT and Digital Services Palanivel Thiaga Rajan indicated therewasnoques- P Thiaga Rajan, DMK leader, TN Minister CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Govt launches exploration licence auction for critical minerals wishes its readers A Happy Dhuleti We are closed today. There will be no edition of the paper on Saturday, March 15, 2025 AGGAM WALIA NEW DELHI, MARCH 13 BUSINESS AS USUAL BY UNNY PAK TRAIN HOSTAGES RETURN Hostages rescued by security forces from a passenger train that was hijacked by rebels arrive at a railway station in Mach, in Pakistan’s Balochistan province, on Thursday. AP REPORT,PAGE16 Former V-C of several universities arrested for posing as Oman’s ‘high commissioner’ ISRO undocks satellites, shot in arm for its future missions NEETIKA JHA GHAZIABAD, MARCH 13 On-boardimagesof SpaDeXundocking.ISROplansmoredocking,undockingexperiments. ISRO KSRanawasnabbedbyUP police,hisvehiclewithblue numberplatehas beenseized routinelymadeforvisitsbysenior diplomats, police said. However, there were two red flags, Ghaziabad Police Commissioner Ajay Kumar Mishra said. First, the term ‘High Commissioner'isonlyusedforCommonwealth countries. “Oman is not partoftheCommonwealth.There cannot be a High Commissioner ofOman.Ifounditoddandasked my team to verify where the CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 ANONNA DUTT NEW DELHI, MARCH 13 NEARLY TWO months after the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully demonstrated its docking capability, it disengaged and undocked the two satellites, SDX01 andSDX02,at9.20amThursday. This capability is essentialfor future ISRO missions such as exploringtheMoon,humanspaceflight,andbuildingitsownspace station. The two satellites, SDX01 E E X P L A I NE D A FORMER Vice-Chancellor of severaluniversities wasarrested in Ghaziabad on Thursday for posing as the “High Commissioner of Oman” to seek VIP protocol and security arrangements, police said. The accused has been identified as K S Rana (66), a resident of Delhi's Lajpat Nagar area. According to police, the District Magistrate's office and the Police Commissionerate in Ghaziabad received a letter on Tuesday requesting “necessary protocol and security arrangements” for “Dr (Prof) K S Rana, High Commissioner of the Sultanate of Oman (Muscat)”. ThelettersaidRanawouldbeattending an “important meeting” in Kaushambi, in Ghaziabad, on Thursday. Security arrangements are tion of a climbdown, pointing to everything from devolution of taxes to population mismatch across states. Speaking at The Indian Express’s Idea Exchange session, Thiaga Rajan, who was earlier theTamilNaduFinanceMinister, said there were “increasing net transfers from the rich states to the poor states”. “And the gap has kept on widening,” he said. “Whenthisgovernmentcameto Why this capability ● is key THE CAPABILITY to dock and undock in space is key to Chandrayaan-4 which is to bring back samples from the Moon. For the Bharatiya Antariksha Station, five modules will be launched separately and joined in space to create the space station. (Chaser) and SDX02 (Target), are now moving around independently in orbit. For the undocking process, the SDX02 arm connecting the two satellites was extended, the captureleversreleased,andthen the two satellites were given the command to separate. With this manoeuvre, ISRO successfully demonstrated critical capabilities like rendezvous, docking and undocking, making Indiathefourthcountryafterthe United States, Russia and China to possess such capability. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 THE MINISTRY of Mines Thursday launched the first trancheof auctionsundertheexploration licence (EL) regime on Thursday, five months after amendingrulestotakechargeof EL auctions following delays by state governments. The tranche includes 13 blocks across 10 states, covering deposits of critical and deepseated minerals such as gold, copper, diamonds, zinc, rare earthelements(REE),vanadium, and zirconium — key inputs for industries ranging from electronics and renewable energy to defence and aerospace. Speaking at the auction launch in Panaji in Goa, Mines Secretary V L Kantha Rao said, “The way in foreign countries private companies go and do exploration on their own, and then get benefit out of that exploration, we are introducing that concept here. We give you some thousand square kilometres and you, as a private company, will goanddoexploration.If youfind thatsomecriticalordeep-seated mineral is available there, then you can get income for the next 50 years on the basis of your discovery.” Of the 13 blocks up for auction, Chhattisgarh (diamond), Jharkhand (gold and copper), and Maharashtra (tantalum and zinc) have two each, while CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 75 AN EXPRESS SERIES YEARS ON RESHAPING THE REPUBLIC CASE BY LANDMARK CASE 1951 STATEOFBOMBAYV NARASUAPPAMALI PAGE 12 Identify areas where US goods can be chosen over China, Govt asks industry Sweeping US tariffs have hit $5billion in MSME steel exports: Exporters to Govt RAVI DUTTA MISHRA Working to protect interests of exporters: Goyal NEW DELHI, MARCH 13 AMID FEARS of export disruptions due to US reciprocal tariffs set to take effect April 2, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry Thursday asked the industry to identify areas where sourcing from China and other countries can be replaced by American goods, executives familiar with the development told The Indian Express. This comes days after US President Donald Trump criticised India’s high tariffs in the automobileandagriculturalsector. The government is working on tariff cuts and market access to avoid sweeping US tariffs that are reshaping global trade and fuellingatradewarinvolvingkey players like China and the European Union. According to a statement from the Ministry, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal said the government is working to protectexporters’interestswhilesimultaneouslypursuingmultiple strategiestoensurethe bestoutcomes for Indian exporters. On reciprocal tariffs, Goyal urgedexporterstomovebeyond a “protectionist mindset” and encouraged them to be bold. Duringameetingwithindustry representatives Thursday, officials discussed the opportunities and impact of these tariffs. Steel and aluminium exporters informedthegovernmentthat$5 billion worth of goods have already been affected by Trump’s 25percenttariffsonthesemetals, CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 THE WORLD PUTIN AGREES IN PRINCIPLE WITH U.S. PROPOSAL FOR 30-DAY CEASEFIRE PAGE 16 Sabarkantha: Dalit man paraded naked for ‘affair with married woman’ EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE AHMEDABAD, MARCH 13 A DALIT man was stripped naked, thrashed and paraded through a village by a group of upper-caste men, including the husband of a woman who he was allegedly having an extramarital affair with, in Sabarkantha district. The incident took place in Vadol village near Idar town of Sabarkantha on March 11. The incident came to light only two days later, on March 13, when thevideoof theincidentwentviral on social media and came to the attention of the police. Idar police booked 15 people intheFIRfiledundertheAtrocity Act and detained nine of them by Thursdayevening, confirmed Idar Police Inspector Chetan Rathod. Police said the victim was thrashed so severely that he had to be admitted to a hospital. “However, no medico-legal case was filed at that time since the victim(outof fear)hadliedtothe doctors that he sustained the injuries after falling down the stairs,” said Sabarkantha Superintendent of Police (SP) Vijay Patel. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Scientist who died in parking fight was part of groundbreaking research PAGE 1 ANCHOR JASBIR MALHI MOHALI, MARCH 13 CONNECTED TO a dialysis machine at a private hospital in Punjab’s Mohali, a devastated Basuki Nath Sonar had just one refrain on Thursday afternoon: “Woh mera Shravan tha (He was an ideal son).” Across town on that same afternoon, pathologists were conductingthepost-mortemexamination of Basuki Nath’s “brilliant” son, Abhishek Swarnkar, 39, a project scientist at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Mohali. A few hours later, on Thursday evening, Abhishek’s nephew conducted his last rites. The civil hospital authorities are yet to reveal the preliminary cause of his death. The only son, he is survived by his parents and two elder sisters, both married. Abhishek,whohadauthored over 100 research papers, was declared dead on arrivalatFortis Hospital late on Tuesday, allegedly following a parking dispute with a neighbour in Mohali’s Sector 66. From Jharkhand, Abhishek, who had undergone a kidney transplant in 2008, was back on dialysis at the time of the incident, his relatives said. According to his peers, Abhishek was involved in “groundbreaking”researchwork on silver nanoparticles that had the “potential to revolutionise renewableenergy”.Anothercolleague mentioned his research on makingsolarenergy moreefficientandaccessibletomillions. HisfamilysaidthatAbhishek got into an argument with his neighbour Maninder Pal Singh alias Monty, 26, late on Tuesday Abhishek Swarnkar (above); his mother Malti Devi (centre) with relatives in Mohali. Jasbir Malhi night. “Abhishek had come home with food for his father, who is undergoing dialysis at a local private hospital. He had parked his bike near a park, which angered Maninder, who started cursing him loudly,” the relative said. Basuki Nath, who was at home, reportedly overheard their loud argument and came down to the spot where the duo wasarguing.Accordingtothepolice,thefootagereportedlyshows Abhishek and Maninder having a heated argument. The neighbourthenpushesAbhishek,who falls on the road. The video later shows Abhishek standing up with an unidentified person’s help before collapsing again. The police said Maninder, who took Abhishek to the hospital, is on the run. Mohali Police Station Phase-11 Station House OfficerGagandeepSinghsaid,“A case under Section 105 (punishment for culpable homicide not amountingtomurder)underthe Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita has been registered against the ac- cused.Effortsareontonabhim.” Meanwhile, Abhishek’s relative said the researcher had moved his family — his ailing father and mother — to Mohali from Dhanbad in Jharkhand since he felt that health infrastructureinthePunjabtownwas superior. In2008,hissisterShwetahad donated one of her kidneys to Abhishek,whohadbeenbattling kidney disease for years. A relative said, “His health had deteriorated recently and he was back on dialysis. He was waiting for another transplant. Despite his struggles, he always remained CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Ahmedabad