NEW DELHI 18 MAY 2025 SUNDAY `12 PAGES 24 facebook/TheMorningStandard X.com/TheMornStandard https://epaper.morningstandard.in Mornings are for Shedding PLUS: 12 PAGES Of Dominance and Submission MAGAZINE EXCLUSIVE VOICES Sultan of Subversion Pushpesh Pant Devdutt Pattanaik Ravi Shankar Preeti Shenoy The Tantric in the Thangka Dinesh Singh Prabhu Chawla Shankkar Aiyar Geetha Ravichandran A Peruvian Bull Run BETWEEN LOVE AND LAUGHTER SWAMI SUKHABODHANANDA SPEAKS Bagging the Modern Heirloom Drop Your Inner Deafness Tharoor on govt’s global India turns the outreach team, Cong sore screws on imports TIT-FOR-TAT DIPLOMACY Wasn’t recommended by party; govt names 7 heads of delegations WILL NOT BE FOUND WANTING: CONG MP P R E E T H A N A I R @ New Delhi Minister’s son held in rural jobs scheme scam in Gujarat D I L I P S I N G H K S H AT R I YA @ Ahmedabad A `71-crore scam under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) has been unearthed in Gujarat, implicating the family of panchayat and agriculture minister Bachu Khabad. His elder son, Balwant Khabad, has been arrested, while his younger son, Kiran Khabad, is under scrutiny . The scam surfaced after B M Patel, director of DRDA, flagged irregularities in project execution in Devgadh Baria and Dhanpur taluks. The scam involved fake infra projects, with funds meant for tribal employment siphoned off to agencies linked to the minister’s sons through fabricated invoices. An audit revealed that Raj Constr uction and Raj Traders, run by Bal- Gujarat minister want and Kiran Bachu Khabad Khabad, were involved in the fraud. Between 2021 and 2025, villages like Kuva, Redhana, and Simamoi were falsely marked as beneficiaries of completed MGNREGA projects. On the ground, there was little to no work—only forged completion reports and a trail of diverted payments. As the probe widened, authorities uncovered that 35 material suppliers—28 from Devgadh Baria and seven from Dhanpur—were involved in routing fake claims with the help of local officials. Senior officers allegedly turned a blind eye, allowing the fraud to fester across multiple administrative levels. Now, a SIT has been formed. The minister did not respond to questions from this newspaper. THE rift between the Congress leadership and Shashi Tharoor deepened on Saturday after the Centre picked him to lead one of the seven multi-party delegations for its diplomatic outreach against Pakistan’s crossborder terror despite the party not recommending his name. Apart from Tharoor, BJP MPs Ravi Shankar Prasad and Baijayant Panda, JD(U)’s Sanjay Jha, DMK’s Kanimozhi, NCP (SP)’s Supriya Sule, and Shiv Sena’s Shrikant Shinde will head the other delegations. Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said the party had submitted four names for the mission and was surprised to see ‘a different name’, Shashi Tharoor, in the official list. The party had suggested the names of Anand Sharma, Gaurav Gogoi, Syed Naseer Hussain and Amrinder Singh Raja Warring for the delegations. Significantly, the party distanced itself from Tharoor’s comments endorsing the Modi government’s handling of the India-Pak conflict and US President Trump’s intervention in announcing the ceasefire. “I am honoured by the invitation to lead an all-party delegation to five key capitals, to present our nation’s point of view on recent events... When national interest is involved, and my services are required, I will not be found wanting. Jai Hind!” Tharoor said “We were asked for names. We expected that the names we had given would be included. But when we saw the press release of PIB, we were surprised. I cannot say what will happen now. Asking four names, giving four names, and announcing another name is dishonest on t h e g ove r n m e n t ’s p a r t , ” Ramesh told the media. “The government cannot include names of MPs in delegations without consulting the party he said. ,” This paper reported on Saturday that the PMO had prepared the list of names and conveyed them to the respective political parties. When asked about Tharoor’s inclusion as a representative of the Congress in the list, Ramesh said that ‘there is a difference between being in the Congress and being of the Congress’. “In a democratic system, when individual MPs are sent as part of an official delegation, MPs must seek the concurrence of the party. If the government wants to send him as part of a delegation, the MP should be asking the party, he said. “The ball is in the government’s court now,” he added. Accusing the government of being ‘dishonest’ in its approach, the leader asserted that the party would not change the four proposed names for the delegation. Ramesh added that Rahul Gandhi has written to Union Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Kiren Rijiju on this. P7 from Bangladesh D I PA K M O N D A L @ New Delhi IN what seems like another ‘retaliatory’ move, the Indian government has imposed restrictions on imports of certain goods from its eastern neighbour Bangladesh. In a directive issued on Saturday by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, the import of all kinds of readymade gar ments from Bangladesh through land ports has been prohibited. These goods will only be allowed to be imported through the seaports of Nhava Sheva and Kolkata. A wider range of goods— including fruit and fruit-flavoured carbonated drinks, processed food items, cotton and cotton yarn waste, plastic and PVC finished goods (excluding essential industrial inputs such as pigments, dyes, plasticisers, and granules), and wooden furniture — will face more HC stays NEET result over power cut at exam centre, seeks NTA’s reply E X P R E S S N E W S S E R V I C E @ Chennai THE Madras High Court has temporarily stayed release of the results of the National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET)-2025 for admission to the undergraduate (UG) courses in medicine. Justice V Lakshminarayanan passed the interim order on Friday while hearing a petition seeking re-examination. The petition, filed by 13 aggrieved students, claimed power outage at the exam centre which “de prived them of equal opportunity and a fair environment”. The 13 affected students had taken the exam at PM Shri Kendriya Vidyalaya CRPF School in Avadi on May 4, 2025. Directing the respondent authorities, including the National Medical Commission (NMC) and the National Testing Agency (NTA), to file reply to the petition by June 2, the judge, accordingly, adjour ned the hearing. Advocate T Saikrishnan, representing the petitioners, submitted that 464 candidates appeared for the examination at the centre where the electricity supply was disconnected (approximately from 3 pm to 4.15 pm) due to gusty winds and heavy rain. The rainwater also entered the exam hall forcing them to be shifted to other halls, he said. The candidates suffered due to poor lighting facilities as the school did not have power backup or generator, causing them to take the exam under extremely uncomfortable situations, thus affecting the performance of the petitioners and other candidates, the counsel said. The students’ request for extra time was tur ned down and so they could not fully complete the exam, leaving them in a disadvantaged position compared to other candidates, he added. A representation was sent to the NTA on the day of the exam itself through e-mail requesting re-examination, but so far, no response has been received, the petition stated. It noted that even a minor disturbance would have serious implications on a candidate’s performance and future as the power outage caused mental distress, heat exhaustion and created grossly unequal conditions. CALF CARE An elephant calf, distressed by its mother’s worsening health, leans over her to offer protective cover, preventing forest officials from administering treatment to the jumbo at the foothills of Maruthamalai in Coimbatore on Saturday | S SENBAGAPANDIYAN A S H I S H S R I V A S TA V A @ New Delhi AT least 13 Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) councillors turned rebel on Saturday announcing a new political front — Indraprastha Vikas Party — in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). The councillors tendered their resignations from the primary membership of AAP weakening the party’s strength in the civic body’s House to 100 from 113. The ruling BJP has 117 and Congress has eight councillors in the House. The group, led by Moralband councillor Hemanchand Goyal, is set to function as an independent bloc within the MCD. In a signed statement submitted to MCD, they cited disillusionment with the AAP’s leadership and internal coordination as key reasons for their departure. “The coordination between the top leadership and municipal councillors was negligible, due to which the party came into the opposition. Due IT had been brewing since Virat Kohli announced his retirement from Tests last Monday. What started as a social media campaign on Tuesday hours af, ter Kohli’s social media post, became a reality on Saturday as thousands of fans came dressed wearing Kohli’s replica Test jersey . “Virat,” the back of the white jersey read “18”. There were some pockets with a lot of Red and Gold, something very com- PHOTO: VINOD KUMAR T stan. For the fans, however, it was about giving their cricketing hero a fitting on-field trib- AT least 10 people, including Hisar-based YouTuber Jyoti Malhotra, have been arrested for allegedly spying for Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). The arrests have been made from Haryana and Punjab in the last fortnight. M a l h o t r a , wh o r u n s a YouTube channel Travel with JO, was booked under various sections of the Official Secrets Act and BNS. She was sent to five-day police remand after being produced before a Hisar court. Her YouTube channel has 377k subscribers and Instagram has 132k followers. As per the FIR, she came in contact with Ehsan-ur-Rahim alias Danish, a staffer at the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi, and visited Pakistan twice in 2023. Danish introduced her to ISI operatives. “She said that she remained in touch with Danish and during her Pakistan visit in 2023, she met Ali Ehwan, who e n s u r e d h e r Jyoti Malhotra, s t a y i n g a n d YouTuber travelling. Ehwan introduced her to Pakistani security and intelligence officials,” the FIR read. Danish was expelled on May 13. Malhotra’s arrest came days after the Punjab Police arrested two persons, including a woman, from Malerkotla district for their alleged role in espionage activities linked to the Pakistani official at the high commission. The accused, Guzala and Yameen Mohamad, both from Malerkotla, had been receiving payments through online transactions in exchange of classified information. On Friday, Haryana cops arrested a 25-year-old PG student from Kaithal for allegedly having links with Pakistani intel operatives. A few days ago, a 24-year-old was arrested in Panipat for allegedly supplying sensitive information to some individuals in Pakistan. to failure to fulfil the promises made to the public, we, the following councillors, are resigning from the primary membership of the party they stated. ,” The most surprising defection among the 13 rebel councilors is former Leader of Opposition Mukesh Goel. Once a prominent Congress figure, he joined AAP ahead of the 2022 civic elections and was named the party’s Leader of the House. The development comes just weeks after the BJP regained control of MCD by winning the mayoral elections. 18-member Standing Committee in civic body to be formed The timing of the defection holds significance as elections for chairpersons of the 12 zonal ward committees to decide the powerful 18-member Standing Committee are approaching. After the recent mayoral polls, AAP appointed Ankush Narang as LoP removing Mukesh Goel. Ever since, there were murmurs of defection as a large number of councillors were unhappy with Narang’s elevation. EXPRESS READ Men in Whites dwarf Red and Gold at Chinnaswamy mon at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. But a lot of the ticketholders had turned a Red wall into a lot of White as they paid tribute to the man who has called this ground home for more than two months every year since 2008. In many ways, Saturday was significant even before Kohli’s sudden announcement. For starters, it marked the resumption of the Indian Premier League after an eight-day break following the escalation of hostilities between India and Paki- H A R P R E E T B A J W A @ Chandigarh Split in AAP, 13 MCD councillors float new front KOHLI TRIBUTE G O M E S H S @ Bengaluru stringent port restrictions. These items will not be allowed entry through northeastern states of Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura, and Mizoram. The restriction also extends to Changrabandha and Fulbari in West Bengal. However, the DGFT clarified that these restrictions do not apply to essential imports such as fish, LPG, edible oil, and crushed stone. The DGFT notification clarified that these port restrictions would not be applicable to Bangladeshi goods transiting through India but destined for Nepal and Bhutan. Though the government has not disclosed the reasons for the move, it is likely that it came in the wake of Bangladesh restricting land imports of cotton yarn from India to protect local industries from cheaper imports. India’s total annual trade with Bangladesh is around $13 billion. Hisar YouTuber held for spying for Pak, leaking sensitive info ute. It did not matter that this wasn’t even an international game. Kohli, as many fans out- side the stadium put it, was, is and will be an emotion to them. They wanted to give a fitting salute to their beloved star. Some fans, when they realised they would not be getting the tickets, decided to shell out money from their own pockets to print white replica jerseys in the name of Kohli and sell them outside the ground. Talamika, an IT professional, said: “We wanted to give a tribute to Kohli. We couldn’t get tickets that is why we are selling the jerseys.” Rain, thunderstorm lead to damage A spell of turbulent weather battered Delhi-NCR on Saturday as dust storms and strong winds lashed the region. The sudden surge in wind speed wreaked havoc—uprooting trees, damaging property, and throwing traffic into disarray. At Ashok Nagar station, the shed of Rapid Rail Metro suffered structural damage. In Connaught Place, trees were uprooted at four different locations, falling on vehicles damaging a couple of them, leading to massive traffic. | P3 Chinese national held for stealing cards A 30-year-old Chinese national was arrested for allegedly stealing the credit and debit cards of fellow passengers during a flight from Hong Kong to Delhi, police said on Saturday. The accused is suspected to be a member of an international gang of organised in-flight theft that targeted passengers during international flights and steal their valuable items, the police said. | P3
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