eye THE SUNDAY EXPRESS MAGAZINE Travelling with India PUNE,LATECITY JUNE29,2025 At her home in Dehradun, Nayantara Sahgal reflects on the Emergency 18+4PAGES,`7.00 DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PATNA, PUNE, VADODARA WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM FOUR-PAGE PULLOUT DHANKHAR WEIGHS IN ‘Secular’, ‘socialist’ in Preamble sacrilege, festering wound: V-P PM Narendra Modi interacts with Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, who is aboard the International Space Station as part of the Axiom-4 mission, on Saturday. During the conversation, the PM told the astronaut that his name has the word ‘shubh (auspicious)’ in it and his space journey was the ‘shubh aarambh (auspicious beginning) of a new age’. PTI REPORT,PAGE11 HISTORY BEGINS, SAYS CEC Revision of Bihar voter rolls starts; 37% have to submit birth proof: EC DAMINI NATH The blank editorial in The Indian Express after the Proclamation THEEMERGENCY 50YEARSON Itsshadow—andlight AN EXPRESS SERIES PAGE 8 29/06/2025 84 112 137 78 Self-proclaimed godman arrested for sexually abusing men EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE PUNE, JUNE 28 PIMPRI CHINCHWAD POLICE have arrested a 29-year-old selfproclaimed godman from Sus Gaon area for allegedly sexually abusing several men under the guise of offering ‘supernatural solutions’ to their financial and personalproblems.Investigators also found that the accused had secretly installed an app on the victims' phones and used to ask them to perform sexual acts on camera. Police have been approached by at least half-adozen victims of the accused. An FIR was registered in this connection on Friday by a 39year-old real estate developer at Bavdhan police station in Pimpri Chinchwad. Police have arrested the accused self-proclaimed godman Prasad Bhimrao Tamdar alias Prasad Dada, a resident of Swami Samarth CONTINUEDONPAGE2 NEW DELHI, JUNE 28 WITHTHEElectionCommission rolling out its “special intensive revision”of Bihar’selectoralrolls this week, the poll panel said on Saturdaythatoutof thetotal7.89 crore electors, 4.96 crore who were on the rolls as on January 1, 2003 would only have to submit the new enumeration form. This means that the remaining 2.93 crore, or about 37% of the electors, will have to submit documents establishing citizenship inadditiontotheform,asperthe EC’s order issued on June 24. Commenting on the start of the process, with booth level officers going house-to-house to distributeformstoelectors,Chief ElectionCommissionerGyanesh Kumar told The Indian Express: “History begins. Proud moment for all Indians. Election Madhubani district election officer Anand Sharma (right) distributes forms among voters. ECI Commission was, is and will always be with the voters.” WithsomeOppositionparties questioning the move, the EC, in its statement on Saturday, invoked the Constitution. “The Constitution of India is supreme. All citizens, political parties and theElectionCommissionof India follow the Constitution. Article 326specifieseligibilitytobecome an elector. Only Indian citizens, above 18 years and ordinary resident in that constituency, are eligible,” the EC said. Oppositionparties,including the RJD, Congress, CPI(M) and TMC, have raised concerns over the exercise. The TMC has NEW DELHI, JUNE 28 A STRATEGIC move to contain China’s expanding footprint in the region, a Sri Lankan SOS for bailout, and a failing Japanese firm — these were among the factorsthatledtotheIndiangovernment-run Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited's decision to acquire a controlling stake in Sri Lanka's Colombo Dockyard PLC under a US$ 52.96 million deal,officialshavetoldTheIndian Express. Announcing its decision on Friday, Mazagon Dock ShipbuildersLimited(MDL)hadsaid: “Located in the Port of Colombo, Colombo Dockyard PLC (CDPLC) gives MDL a strategic foothold in the Indian Ocean Region — a key maritime corridor.” CDPLC,listedontheColombo NEW DELHI, JUNE 28 TWODAYSafterRSS generalsecretary Dattatreya Hosabale sought a discussion on whether the words ‘socialist’ and ‘secular’ added in the Constitution’s Preamble by the Indira Gandhi government during the Emergency should remain, the chorus for their removal is only growing louder. On Saturday, Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar waded into the political debate, saying that changing the Preamble by adding the words ‘socialist’, ‘secular’ and ‘integrity’ during the Emergency was “sacrilege to the spirit of sanatan”. Joining the issue, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said ‘socialism’ and ‘secularism’ were Western concepts, and these words have no place in the Indian civilisation. Addressing an event at his residence in Delhi, Vice President Dhankhar said, “If you deeply reflect, we are giving CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Stock Exchange, is the flagship of SriLanka'smaritimeindustryand serves a wide spectrum of commercialandgovernmentalclients across Asia, Middle East and Africa. Officials from both the Sri Lankan and Indian governments workedovertimetoconcludethis strategic deal on Sri Lanka's largest shipyard, said sources. According to officials, CDPLC has been in dire straits for some CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 EXPRESS NETWORK ACTOR-MODEL SHEFALI JARIWALA DIES AT 42 PAGE 4 AMRAVATI VILLAGE USES TAX WAIVERS TO WOO CHILDREN TO ZP SCHOOL PAGE 3 Almirahs as ‘walls’, 2 shifts: In Mumbai school, Classes 1-8 students are in one hall since 2022 PALLAVI SMART MUMBAI, JUNE 28 Inside the hall at the school in Mankhurd area. Videograb Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, Chief Justice of India B R Gavai and Union Minister Nitin Gadkari at the inauguration of a ‘Constitution Preamble Park’ in Nagpur. PTI Debate heats up, but apex court always upheld Preamble amendment APURVA VISHWANATH NEW DELHI, JUNE 28 several key leaders — from Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar, RSS leader Dattatreya Hosabale to Union ministers Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Jitendra Singh — have questioned the Emergencyera amendment of the Preamble. ● In 1976, the Preamble was amended by the Constitution (Forty-second Amendment) Act to add the expressions. The chapter on Fundamental Duties E THE POLITICAL debate on the Emergency-era inclusionof theexpressions ‘secular’ and ‘socialist’ to the Preamble of the Constitution is once again heating up, butcourtrulingsandparliamentary debates in the past have always upheld the 42nd Constitutional amendment. Over the past few days itself, CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 CJI: SC upheld Article 370 abrogation so there is one Constitution OMKAR GOKHALE & ANKITA DESHKAR MUMBAI, NAGPUR, JUNE 28 CHIEF JUSTICE of India B R Gavai on Saturday said the Supreme Court upheld the abrogation of Article 370, which gave special status to Jammu and Kashmir, “so that the country is governed by only one Constitution”, as envisioned by Dr B R Ambedkar. The CJI was in Nagpur for the inauguration of a 'Constitution Preamble Park' and unveiling of Ambedkar's statue at a law college. The CJI was part of the fivejudge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court, led by then CJI D Y Chandrachud, that, in December 2023, upheld the Centre's decision to abrogate Article 370. “When Parliament abrogated Article 370 and the challenge against it came before us, duringthehearingIhadreferred to Dr Ambedkar's speech. He hadsaidthatintheUnitedStates of America, there is a Constitution of the federal government which governs very limited subjects, and every state also has its Constitution which has more scope,” CJI Gavai said. “That is why Dr Ambedkar had said that this country needs only one Constitution to keep it united. Before abrogation of Article 370, a separate Constitution for just one state was not as per Ambedkar's vision or thinking and, therefore, we unanimously upheld CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Behind Mazagon Dock’s Lanka deal: Eye on China, Colombo bailout plea SHUBHAJIT ROY EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE EXPLAINED ‘SHUBH AARAMBH OF A NEW AGE’ Secularismand socialismwestern concepts:Himanta; Fadnavis:Preamble reflectsessenceof Constitution ‘AMBEDKAR FOR ONE CONSTITUTION’ FOR THE students of a civic body-run Marathi-medium school in Mumbai’s Mankhurd, the biggest concern since 2022 has been the long walk home. Never mind that nearly 100 of them have been “temporarily” crammed inside one big multipurpose hall — with steel almirahs serving as “walls” instead of partitions — for almost three years now. A recent video shot by Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) leader Ravi Gawas inside thehallbroughttheissuetolight. Under this makeshift arrangement, the students of Mankhurd Marathi-Medium School No 1 have been studying in shifts inside a 1,000-squarefoot hall on the sixth floor of the Maharashtra Nagar BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) School, also in CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 ‘No choice for parents’: Amid protests, Kerala govt doubles down on Zumba in schools EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE Kolkata law student’s rape: Video found in phone of accused, college guard held THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, JUNE 28 RAVIK BHATTACHARYA AMID GROWING protests against the Kerala government’s decision to introduce the fitness dance form Zumba in schools, the state’s Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led government has said it would not budge. The government had announced introducing Zumba in schools earlier this year. The decision has triggered protests from religious outfits such as SAMSATHA, which has a high stake in religious education in Kerala and outside the state. The outfits claim that the move would adversely affect morality. On Saturday, the protests swelledaftermoreorganisations came out against it. CPI(M)generalsecretaryMA Baby told media in Kozhikode that organisations had the right to make comments on issues including in the education sector, A VIDEO of the crime found on thephoneof theaccusedislikely to serve as clinching evidence in the alleged rape of a law student inside a Kolkata college where she studies, investigators have told The Indian Express. The 24-year-old student was allegedly raped on Wednesday, afterwhichpolicearrestedthree men — Monojit Mishra (31), a contractual staffer, who was a TMCstudents’wingfunctionary, and two students, Zaib Ahmed (19) and Pramit Mukherjee (20). Itisallegedthatthetwostudents allegedly forced the woman into a guard room and stopped her from escaping while Mishra raped her. A five-member SIT headed byanAssistantCommissionerof Police has been formed to probe the case. On Saturday, the Kolkata police made a fourth arrest — a se- CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 KOLKATA JUNE 28 West Bengal BJP president Sukanta Majumdar leads a protest in Kolkata. Partha Paul. curityguardatthecollege.Inher complaint, the woman has alleged that the guard was asked to vacate his room before she was raped there. “We found CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 MORE REPORTS PAGE 9 In Pant’s comeback, pride for those who helped during crash: ‘Motivating’ PAGE 1 ANCHOR NITIN SHARMA CHANDIGARH, JUNE 28 AS INDIA vice captain Rishabh Pant slammed a six and then somersaulted after scoring the first of his two centuries against England in the Test match at Headingley, Leeds, thousands of miles away in Muzaffarnagar district of Uttar Pradesh, a teenager leapt in celebration. Nishu Kumar, 19, who was glued to his phone, isn’t just an- other Pant fan; his association with the wicketkeeper-batsman runs deeper. When Pant was involved in a near fatal car crash on the Delhi-Dehradun highway in December 2022, Nishu and his friend Rajat Kumar were among thosewhopulledthecricketerout ofthecarandtookhimtohospital. Last Saturday, Nishu gathered his friends at his one-room home in Muzaffarnagar’s Buchabasti village to watch Pant take on the English bowlers in their backyard. “What a comeback it was with that somersault to celebrate the hundred,” Nishu tells The Indian Express. “Rishabh bhaiya showed the world he is back!” The smiling and jumping Pant he saw on TV was different tothepersonheencounteredon the night of the accident near Roorkee in Uttarakhand. Nishu, along with Rajat, was heading to workatasugarmillinthenearby town of Libberheri when he saw a car catch fire after hitting the divider on the highway. At that moment, they didn’t know who the person inside was. “On the way to the hospital, in the ambulance, he showed us his pictures on our phone and told us he is Rishabh Pant,” says an emotional Nishu. “When we RishabhPantwithNishuKumar(right),whowasamongthose whopulledhimoutof thecaraftertheaccidentin2022. saw bhaiya after the accident, nobody,includingus,thoughthe would play cricket again.” Nishu says Pant gifted him and Rajat scooters as a gesture of gratitude for their life-saving help. This year the cricketer also invited them for an IPL match in Lucknow.“WhenRishabhbhaiya invited us to Lucknow, it was the first time that I was watching him play in front of my eyes. Later,healsogavemeaLucknow Super Giants jersey and made sure there were no shortcomingsinourstayatLucknow,”says Nishu, who has been out of a job for the last few months now. “I also saw (Australia’s World Cup winner) Mitchell Marsh at the team hotel but for me, Rishabh bhaiya is the superstar. WhenItoldhimthatIdon’thave a job, he assured me that he will see to it and do something.” Nishu and Rajat weren’t the only ones who helped Pant that night. Paramjit Singh Nain, conductor of a Haryana Roadways bus running on the HaridwarPanipatroute,vividlyrecallsseeing Pant’s car somersault over the road barrier and land “50100 metres” away. Nain says he rushed to help, along with driver Sushil Kumar. “When we rushed, we saw a man stuck halfway between the seat and the windshield. While Sushil called the police, I called theambulanceandafterhelparrived, we left for our destination,”saysNain,nownicknamed ‘Pant’ at the depot. Kumar, 32, says he narrates the ‘Pant story’ to his son to motivate him when the going gets tough. “My son is a judo player and I always tell him to have the mental strength like Pant… I don’t know anything about cricket. But if the whole world is talking about Pant, then it’s the biggest motivation for others to see what he has achieved after that fateful night,” says Kumar. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2