Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman chairs the 47th meeting of the GST Council in Chandigarh on Tuesday | pti chennai l wednesday l june 29, 2022 l `9.00 l PAGES 20 l late city EDITION Oppn-ruled states want gst compensation to continue Change the revenue sharing formula or extend compensation period by five years, state finance ministers have demanded Devolve 80% of revenue to states: DEO States’ protected revenue has been growing at 14% but cess collection has not risen at the same rate. Chhattisgarh Finance Minister T S Singh Deo said states need to get 70-80% of the GST revenue instead of 50% at present. “If the protective revenue provision is not continued, 50% formula should be changed to 80-70% for SGST and 20-30% for CGST,” said Deo | P12 ■ 11.6% Address shortfall, says Balagopal ■ Kerala Finance Minister K N Balagopal said the compensation period should be extended as revenue growth is not as promised The GST Council meeting, being held in Chandigarh, will discuss the compensation mechanism. According to a recent Supreme Court ruling, the Council’s decisions are not binding on states The weighted average tax rate under gST, according to a Reserve Bank study CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA ■ BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOgGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI Fadnavis meets Guv, demands Maha floor test Says govt has lost majority; Koshyari to seek legal opinion before calling special session S u d h i r S u r ya w a n s h i a n d Rajesh Kumar Thakur @ Mumbai/New Delhi The ongoing political drama in Maharashtra moved into high gear on Tuesday after a BJP delegation led by former chief minister Devendra Fadnavis met Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari and requested him to ask the Uddhav government to seek a floor test, saying it has lost its majority . Earlier in the day, Fadnavis flew into Delhi along with senior advocate Mahesh Jethmalani to consult home minister Amit Shah and party chief J P Nadda. Sources said the Governor will seek legal opinion before deciding on a special session of Maharashtra Assembly for the floor test. As for beleaguered Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray he , made yet another emotional appeal to his party’s rebel legislators led by Eknath Shinde to save his chair, requesting them to return from Guwahati to thrash out a solution. Parallelly, his wife Rashmi called up family members of the rebels, invoking the family spirit and asking them to request their spouses to return. Fadnavis reportedly conveyed to the party brass that there were two options. One, staking the BJP’s claim with the backing of rebels by promising them proportional representation in the state cabinet; Rebel Shiv Sena leader Eknath Shinde addresses the media in Guwahati | PTI Hindutva card Uddhav sought to play the Hindutva card, by deciding to push through a proposal to rename Aurangabad as Sambhaji Nagar in the state cabinet on Wednesday. The dilution of Hindutva by the Sena was one of the factors that triggered the rebellion and two, facilitating a no-confidence motion by the rebels. Within the rebel camp, there were different voices on the next steps. “While one section wants a merger with the BJP, others are in favour of retaining the Sena identity The latter . want a meeting with Uddhav find a way out,” said a person camped in Guwahati. He added that most of the rebels are not allowed to speak freely. “They are missing their families and constituencies. They are pressuring Shinde for a solution.” But Shinde rubbished claims that the rebels were in touch with Uddhav. P10 Advantage India as G7 wants Russia oil price cap E x p r e ss N e w s s e r v i c e @ New Delhi IN a bid to weaken Russia’s ability to fund the Ukraine war, the Group of Seven (G7) leaders on Tuesday agreed to develop a price cap mechanism for Russian oil. According to reports, the G7 leaders discussed the US’ suggestion that a price cap decided by consuming countries be imposed. While the contours of the scheme have not been announced, reports say Moscow will be allowed to recover production cost and earn a very small profit for its petroleum products. For India, which currently Past example A similar mechanism was launched in 1995 as part of the oil-for-food programme by the UN to allow Iraq to sell oil in exchange for food and medicine. However, the programme was mired in widespread corruption a price ceiling. “Russian oil is anyway available at $30-35 discount to India. Even if G7 imposes a ceiling on paper, there will be significant leakages as witnessed from Europe’s socalled ban on Russian energy I . don’t foresee any major shift in India’s import bill with a price ceiling on Russian crude,” said Debopam Chaudhury, chief economist and head of research at TruBoard Partners. Russia produces around 11 million barrels per day of crude oil, and exports 5-6 million barrels per day. Moscow earned around $110 billion in 2021 from oil exports, which accounts for 45% of its total income in 2021. NATIONWIDE June 27 June 28 Jab-o-meter Fresh cases Recoveries Deaths 17,073 15,208 21 11,793 9,486 27 tamil nadu June 27 June 28 Fresh cases Recoveries Deaths 1,461 697 0 1,484 736 0 Take your shot June 27 16,56,479 doses June 28 11,79,301 doses Total doses 1,97,44,90,295 Amid outrage, Zubair remanded in Udaipur tailor butchered for supporting Nupur four more days of police custody E x p r e ss N e w s S e r v i c e @ New Delhi A Delhi court on Tuesday remanded senior journalist and Alt News’ co-founder Mohammed Zubair in four-day police custody The police had arrest. ed him on Monday in connection with a four-year-old tweet, alleging it had led to a Twitter storm, hurting religious sentiments and promoting enmity . Media and human rights organisations like Amnesty India, Editors Guild and Press Club of India strongly condemned the arrest, calling it extremely disturbing. “It is apparent that Alt News’ alert vigilance was resented by those who use disinformation as a tool to polarise society,” the guild said in a statement. Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Snigdha Sarvaria said, “Four-day police remand is being granted since the accused is Transpersons to fly Chennai Corpn’s drones Muhammad Zubair being taken to court in Delhi on Tuesday | Parveen Negi to be taken to Bangaluru.” Appearing for Zubair, senior advocate Vrinda Grover argued that he was being maliciously targeted and that the case as a whole borders on ridiculousness. She alleged that Zubair was targeted because of his religious identity. “Many have tweeted the same, the only difference between those handles and mine is my faith, my name and my profession.” But the prosecution contended that Zubair ought to be placed under police remand because his “intentional act of outraging religious emotions was on record.” Zubair allegedly “used provocative tweets to offend religious emotions in an effort to achieve recognition,” according to the police. A four-member police team will be sent to Zubair’s house in Bengaluru on Wednesday to recover evidence. The police claimed Zubair received `50 lakh in his bank account in the last three months, adding they were probing the source of the funding. But Alt News co-founder Pratik Sinha said, “Absolutely lies. Police is linking donations received by Alt News to Zubair. All the money that Alt News receives goes to the organisations bank and not any individuals.” express read Worker killed while cleaning Chennai manhole, 1 hospitalised Chennai: A private contract employee clearing underground drainage died of asphyxiation in Chennai on Tuesday, while one of his colleagues has been hospitalised. Both of them inhaled noxious gases from a manhole in Madhavaram and fell inside, said a police officer. The police have registered a case and arrested the supervisors of the company they worked for | P4 EXPRE SS NEWS S ERVICE @ Chennai Though more and more transpersons are enrolling for courses, getting a job remains a challenge. In a bid to change this, the Chennai Corporation will hire seven transpersons to operate drones that spray larvicide and control the city’s mosquito menace. A council resolution to this effect was adopted on Tuesday While the corpora. tion needs seven drone operators, it has now recruited two, including a transman, E Prem (19). Of ficials said more transpersons will be recruited on a contract basis. Prem, a certified operator from Vellore, finished his schooling only last year. “I decided to work instead of going to college due to financial reasons. I initially attended the training because I had free time, but now, I find it easy and enjoyable to fly drones,” he said. Prem will start work from July, and get a basic salary of `25,000 for the contract period. The initiative to recruit transgender drone operators after training them was led by KR Srikanth, retired wing commander and chief operations officer of the Remote Pilot Training Organization, Chennai. He identified 15 transpersons, trained them, and helped get them jobs. The transgender students were picked for training with the help of NGOs working for transgender rights. For the first month, they were trained in English, which was the medium of instruction, before the actual 10-day training programme began. representative picture imports 10% of its total crude requirements from Russia, the move will be beneficial as it will help combat inflation. Before the Ukraine war, India used to import just 0.2% of its total oil needs from Russia. As the western countries put sanctions on Russian oil, Moscow started offering deep discounts for its products. Thus, Indian Oil Marketing Companies purchased Russian Ural crude oil at discounts as high as $30 per barrel. Reports say 40% Russian oil was purchased by private firms including Reliance Industries and Rosneft-backed Nayara Energy . However, experts say consuming countries can’t enforce such Four dead as ONGC chopper crashes into Arabian Sea Cement rode Shoddy workmanship made it look like this newly-laid road was absorbing a motorcycle in Vellore on Tuesday | S Dinesh | P7 Mumbai: Pawan Hans’ Sikorsky chopper with nine people on board crashed into the Arabian Sea, about 50 nautical miles from the Mumbai coast on Tuesday, killing four people. The helicopter, which was part of the six Sikorsky S-76D helicopters that Pawan Hans had recently leased, was 4-5 minutes away from ONGC’s Sagar Kiran rig when the incident took place, company officials said Contempt plea filed against EPS & team R S IVA K UMAR @ Chennai A contempt petition, seeking action against AIADMK leaders, including joint coordinator Edappadi K Palaniswami, has been filed before the Madras High Court for “wilful disobedience” of the order passed by a division bench over adopting resolutions at the AIADMK general council meeting held in Chennai on June 23. The petition filed by M Shanmugam, a general council member of the party from Tiruppur, also sought a stay on appointing Tamil Magan Hussain as permanent presidium chairman of the party and an injunction on the general council meeting scheduled for July 11. The petitioner said the general council, executive council, and leaders, including Palaniswami, CVe Shanmugam, KP Munusamy D , Jayakumar, Tamil Magan Hussain, and Dindigul Sreenivasan, had committed wilful breach and wilful disobedience of the HC order. Shanmugam also said the announcement of the next general council meet on July 11, without the authorisation from both the coordinator and the joint coordinator, is an act of contempt. The petitioner said that without circulating the approved resolutions, CVe Shanmugam had unilaterally declared them as rejected by the general council, at the meeting held on June 23. The for mer minister had also an- nounced that the resolutions would be accepted only if the general council approved the single leadership (of Palaniswami). The conduct of the respondents clearly established that they have no regard for the court order and they have committed a “deliberate and flagrant violation” of the court order, the petitioner said. Hearing the original petition filed by Shanmugam, a single judge (Justice Krishnan Ramasamy) on June 22 ordered that there was no bar on the general council going ahead and transacting business as it deemed fit. P4 MGR Youth Wing secretary booked for assault The Chennai police have registered a case against Krishnasamy, secretary of MGR Youth Wing in Kolathur and a supporter of O Panneerselvam, for allegedly assaulting an AIADMK functionary at the party headquarters on June 18 attacked him with sharp weapons. They also reportedly slit IN a horrific hate crime in Ra- his throat with a cleaver. The jasthan’s Udaipur district, two killers then fled the scene. Soon men on Tuesday killed a tailor after the shocking incident, a who had recently exlarge crowd gathered pressed support for at the spot and desuspended BJP leader manded tough action Nupur Sharma over against the culprits. controversial remarks Rajasthan Chief on Prophet MohamMinister Ashok Gehlot mad. The killers, who tweeted that no effort also posted videos of will be spared in catchtheir brutal attack ing the culprits and a claiming they did it to detailed probe will be Kanhaiya Lal avenge insult to Islam, conducted over the have been arrested. brutal incident. In the video, they also threatA curfew has been imposed ened to target Nupur Sharma in many parts of Udaipur and and even Prime Minister markets are shut. Large gatherNarendra Modi. ings have been banned and inThe attackers, identified as ternet suspended across RajasGos Mohammad and Riyaz, than for 24 hours. came on a bike at around 2.30 The victim, who lived in the pm on Tuesday. They entered Dhanmondi area of Udaipur, the tailoring shop of Kanhaiya had posted on social media in Lal (40) on the pretext of giving support of Nupur Shar ma measurements and suddenly some 10 days ago. R a j e s h As n a n i @ Jaipur