25032024-TT-01.qxd 3/24/2024 11:52 PM Page 1 13 CHANDIGARH | GURUGRAM | JALANDHAR | BATHINDA | VOL. 144 NO. 84 | 14 PAGES | ~5.00 | REGD. NO. CHD/0006/2024-2026 ESTABLISHED IN 1881  HIMACHAL PRADESH KREMLIN LAUNCHES ANOTHER MAJOR MISSILE ATTACK ON KYIV WORLD /thetribunechd CONG’S RAMAN BHALLA, LAL SINGH KICK OFF POLL CAMPAIGN J&K REGENERATIVEFARMING PAKISTAN TO CONSIDER KEY TO AGRO-ECOSYSTEM RESTORING TRADE TIES WITH REVITALISATION INFOCUS INDIA: DAR BACK PAGE monday | 25 march 2024 /thetribunechd www.tribuneindia.com HAPPY HOLI TO OUR READERS BJP picks Manekafor Sultanpur, Kangana Mandi, Jindal K’shetra Patriotic hues 5th list of 111 out |Varun Gandhi dropped from Pilibhit, VK Singh Ghaziabad Aditi Tandon Tribune News Service HOLIDAY NOTICE The offices of The Tribune will remain closed today on account of Holi. There will, therefore, be no issue of the paper tomorrow (March 26). Bhadauria,former IAFChief,joinsBJP Tribune News Service New Delhi, March 24 Former Indian Air Force Chief RKS Bhadauria along with ex-bureaucrat and former MP Varaprasad Rao joined the BJP on Sunday. Bhadauria was the 23rd IAF Chief from September 30, 2019, to September 30, 2021. Bhadauria had earlier termed the Balakot air strikes of February 26, 2019, as “the most significant air action by the IAF in four decades with fighters penetrating the Pakistan airspace, launching precise attacks and returning home safely”. With the Balakot air strikes after the Pulwama terror attack, India ended the red line it had imposed on itself. Mirage 2000 fighters of the IAF conducted pre-dawn air strikes and bombed JeM targets in Balakot. Speaking on his joining the BJP in the presence of party’s continued on page 7 Absentfromduty, EC wants Amloh SDM penalised Chandigarh, March 24 The Election Commission has issued directions to take disciplinary action against Amloh Sub-Divisional Magistrate Amardeep Singh Thind in Fatehgarh Sahib district of Punjab for being absent from poll duty. Punjab Chief Electoral Officer Sibin C said that in place of Thind, the Election Commission had appointed Karandeep Singh as the Assistant Returning Officercum-SDM of Amloh to ensure the smooth conduct of the Lok Sabha elections. The polling for Punjab’s 13 Lok Sabha seats will be held on June 1. Fatehgarh Sahib Deputy Commissioner Parneet Shergill said Thind had been absent from duty without informing anyone since Tuesday. — TNS New Delhi, March 24 The BJP on Sunday released the fifth list of 111 candidates for the Lok Sabha elections, retaining former Union minister Maneka Gandhi from Sultanpur and denying her son Varun Gandhi, the sitting Pilibhit MP a renomination. , Maneka, 67, is the seniormost MP (eight terms) in the outgoing 17th Lok Sabha. Jitin Prasada, who was minister in the Congress-led UPA regime before joining the BJP replaced Varun as the , BJP’s Pilibhit candidate. The Tribune had earlier reported that the BJP would not field both Maneka and her son. In another important development, seconds after Naveen Jindal, former twotime Congress MP from Haryana, and Ranjit Chautala, the son of late deputy Prime Minister Devi Lal, joined the BJP on Sunday, they were named the party’s candidates from Kurukshetra and Hisar seats, respectively. Sitting Rohtak MP Arvind Sharma will defend his seat while MLA Madan Lal Badoli will be the Sonepat candidate. From Kangra, the BJP has fielded Rajeev Bhardwaj amid calls to give the seat to a Brahmin leader. Former Congress MP Naveen Jindal joins the BJP in the presence of BJP general secretary Vinod Tawde in New Delhi. MANAS RANJAN BHUI 402 CANDIDATES NAMED SO FAR Maneka Gandhi Sultanpur Kangana Ranaut Mandi Jitin Prasada Pilibhit Ranjit Singh Chautala Hisar Arun Govil Meerut Justice A Gangopadhyay Tamluk Rajiv Bhardwaj Kangra | Mohan Lal Badoli Sonepat | Arvind Sharma Rohtak From West Bengal, the BJP has fielded former Calcutta High Court judge Abhijit Gan- gopadhyay from Tamluk and sitting MP Raju Bista from Darjeeling, where former For- eign Secretary Harsh Shringla was also in the running. BJP’s Kerala state chief K Surendran will take on former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi in Wayanad. The saffron party’s candidate opposite TMC’s Mahua Moitra in Krishnanagar will be Amrita Roy from the erstwhile Nadia royalty in the state. Roy joined the BJP only this week. The list (with which the total number of candidates declared by BJP reached 402) features actors Arun Govil (who played Lord Rama in the famous Doordarshan series ‘Ramayana’) and Kangana Ranaut as candidates from Meerut in UP and Mandi in Himachal Pradesh, respectively. Four Union ministers — Dharmendra Pradhan (Rajya Sabha MP), Giriraj Singh, Nityanand Rai and RK Singh — have been nominated. While Pradhan will contest from Odisha’s Sambalpur, Giriraj, Rai and Singh will defend their Bihar seats — Begusarai, Ujiarpur and Ara, respectively. Among those declared today are two former Chief Ministers — Jagadish Shettar (Karnataka) and Kiran Reddy (undivided Andhra Pradesh). The following exUnion ministers have secured continued on page 7 Defence Minister Rajnath Singh celebrates Holi with defence personnel in Leh on Sunday. PTI INDIA bloc to hold mega rally to ‘save democracy’ on Mar 31 Anshita Mehra Tribune News Service New Delhi, March 24 To safeguard country’s interests and democracy, the INDIA bloc will organise a “maha rally” at Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan on March 31. This was announced by Delhi AAP state convener Gopal Rai here today. The rally, to be organised in solidarity with AAP national convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, would aim at galvanising people to stand against the It’s murder, sellers booked under Kejri issues order from Sec 302: Mann on liquor deaths ED custody; forged: BJP Anshita Mehra Tribune News Service Sushil Goyal Sangrur, March 24 Visiting families of the liquor tragedy victims at Gujjran village in Sangrur district, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann today said it was a case of murder. He said the government would get to the root of the problem and tackle it. The CM was accompanied by Finance Minister and Dirba MLA Harpal Singh Cheema. Mann said the police had registered murder cases in the incident. “FIRs under Section 302 (of the IPC) have been registered against the accused. Killing somebody by giving poison is a murder,” he said. Till now, the police had arrested 10 suspects in the case, he added. “We are trying to find out if these accused have more links in Punjab. If there are more gangs selling spurious liquor, they will also be arrested,” Mann said. Expressing their anger over the deaths, some women appealed to the Chief Minister to take steps to stop the sale of ‘chitta’ and spuri- New Delhi, March 24 Amid speculation over his role as Delhi Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal has issued his first directive from ED custody, asking his minister to address water-related concerns in the national capital. The move, however, hasn’t gone down well with opposition BJP which has termed it , “unconstitutional”. Kejriwal was arrested by the Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann meets bereaved relatives of those killed in liquor tragedy at Gujjran village in Sangrur. TRIBUNE PHOTO TWO MORE ARRESTED, 10 SO FAR The police on Sunday arrested two more suspects — Mangal and Veeru Saini — in the case, said DIG, Patiala Range, Harcharan Singh Bhullar. With the two arrests, the police have so far nabbed 10 persons. ous liquor in the village. The tragedy has claimed 21 lives in Sangrur. Punjab BJP president Sunil Jakhar also visited Gujjran village and met members of the bereaved families. He said Mann had lost moral authority to remain in the office. Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira today visited Ravidaspura Tibbi in Sunam and met bereaved families. Talking to mediapersons, Khaira demanded a compensation of Rs 25 lakh each for the families of the victims. continued on page 7 edit: Liquor tragedy AGENCY TAKES NOTE The ED has taken cognisance of Delhi minister Atishi’s claim Kejriwal sent her orders from custody, sources said. The ED will hold a probe to ascertain if directions were in line with special PMLA court’s order. Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday over his alleged involvement in a money laundering case associated with the excise policy. Following continued on page 7 Alliance unites in Delhi CM Kejriwal’s support AAP’s Atishi Marlena and Gopal Rai with Congress’ Arvinder Lovely. alleged authoritarianism of the present government. “The arrest of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal by IN BRIEF JD(U) names all 16 candidates, drops two MPs NEW DELHI: JD(U) on Sunday dropped sitting MPs Sunil Kumar Pintu from Sitamarhi and Kavita Singh from Siwan as it announced the candidates for all 16 Lok Sabha seats in its kitty in Bihar. The JD(U) has left 17 seats for the BJP and rest for other allies. INSIDE Indian professional killed in car accident in US NEW YORK: Indian professional Arshia Joshi (24) was killed in a car accident in the US state of Pennsylvania. Arshia was killed on March 21, the Consulate General of India in New York said in a post on X. She had completed her graduation last year. BACK PAGE Clinical trials of TB vaccine for adults start in India NEW DELHI: Bharat Biotech has begun the clinical trials for tuberculosis (TB) vaccine MTBVAC on adults in India. Developed by the Spanish biopharmaceutical company Biofabri, the MTBVAC is the first vaccine against TB derived from a human source. TNS IIT-Guwahati student arrested under UAPA for ‘ISlinks’hunt on for another , Guwahati, March 24 An IIT-Guwahati student, who had allegedly pledged allegiance to ISIS, was arrested under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act on Sunday, a senior official said here. Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma said that two students of IIT-Guwahati had been identified as having links with ISIS and trying to join the group, but one of them is “not found” as of now. Of the Both belong to Delhi’s Batla House locality two, Touseef Ali Farooqui, a 4th-year BTech student of Bioscience Department, was detained on Saturday. The CM said both belonged Batla House area of Delhi and had been “radicalised”. Assam Police’s Special Task Force Inspector General Parthasarathi Mahanta said after interrogating him, the police found “credible evidence of his links with ISIS and he was arrested on Sunday. “We produced him in the court, which has sent him to police custody for 10 days. We also carried out a search in his hostel room inside the IIT-Guwahati campus. A black flag, purportedly similar to that of ISIS, was found in his hostel,” Mahanta said. — PTI Into third week of fast, Sonam Wangchuk says need to represent ‘nature’ in Parl Naseer A Ganai Srinagar, March 24 As his fast entered the 19th day, Ladakhi activist Sonam Wangchuk called for having “nature representatives” in Parliament in his feeble voice. Drawing parallels between Delhi and the ecologically sensitive Ladakh, Wangchuk proposed “giving nature a voice” in the highest policymaking body of the country, saying that ecological concerns must be given a fair representation. Wangchuk called for the implementation of the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution in Ladakh to grant indigenous tribes nominal autonomy. Wangchuk said the idea of having “nature representatives” in Parliament might initially seem somewhat shocking. “The idea may shock you, but let me put it this way… in FRAGILE LADAKH REQUIRES ATTENTION of wild nature, ❝ Ladakh is a vast area (60,000 sq km)Parliament for glaciers… all this is not represented in our policymaking. How about having representation based on area and not just human population alone? Sonam Wangchuk, ACTIVIST early 1900s, the idea of giving voting rights to women was shocking…. In 1920, the US brought in a law for women’s voting rights,” he said. Similarly, Wangchuk said, in 1965 the US brought in a law to allow people of all colours to vote. “Today, it’s just unthinkable that a black person, because of his colour, would not be allowed to vote. So, we take the idea of inclusion to the next level and give nature a voice to have nature representatives. Tomorrow, it might be unthinkable for us to think that nature was never represented in our Parliaments of the past,” he said. He said representation in Parliament is “human-centric”. “For example, Delhi, with an area of 1,500 sq km, has seven MPs, and Ladakh, continued on page 7 c m y b the Modi regime showcases authoritarianism at its peak,” Gopal Rai said, emphasising continued on page 7 Climate activist Sonam Wangchuk during his protest in Leh. REUTERS Rewari unit offers ~7L to blast-hit; not enough: Kin Ravinder Saini Tribune News Service Rohtak, March 24 The death toll in the March 16 auto spares manufacturing unit blast case rose to 14 with one more succumbing to his injuries at the PGIMS here on Sunday. While the victims’ families claim the financial help of Rs 7 lakh being offered by the factory management is not enough, the district authorities are holding negotiations to get the monetary aid enhanced. ANOTHER WORKER SUCCUMBS, CASUALTIES MOUNT TO 14 “Workers have paid with their lives. Hence we have asked the factory management to provide at least Rs 20 lakh each, instead of Rs 7 lakh, to the next of kin of those killed. Negotiations are underway with the management and we expect a considerable increase in the aid,” a district official told The Tribune. Firoz, brother of one of the victims from Gonda (Uttar Pradesh), continued on page 7