Vol. 67 No. 123 | WEDNESDAY | FEBRUARY 21, 2024 | 27 Pages | `5 & for Pune `6 only Quality at Value www.freepressjournal.in EDITIONS: MUMBAI*, Pune, Nashik, Konkan, Indore, Bhopal, E-paper Hamara Sankalp Viksit Bharat THE FP BULLETIN ANUSHKA GIVES BIRTH TO BOY I ndian batting star Virat Kohli and actor Anushka Sharma on Tuesday announced the birth of their second child, a boy named Akaay. “With abundant happiness and hearts full of love, we are pleased to inform everyone that on 15th February, we welcomed our baby boy Akaay and Vamika’s little brother into this world. We seek your blessings and good wishes in this beautiful time in our lives…. Love and gratitude, Virat and Anushka,” the couple said in identical posts on social media. The comments thread on Anushka’s post exploded. Ranveer Singh left hearts, while Shweta Bachchan wrote “Congratulations” as did Sonam Kapoor. SONIA, NADDA ELECTED TO RS F ormer Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP chief JP Nadda, new party entrant Ashok Chavan and Union ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan were among 41 candidates elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh will witness polling on February 27. The BJP has won the highest number of 20 seats, followed by the Congress (6), Trinamool Congress (4), YSR Congress (3), RJD (2), BJD (2) and NCP , Shiv Sena, BRS and JD(U) one each. As there were no other candidates in the fray on these 41 seats, the respective returning officers declared them winners on the last date of withdrawal of nominations. ONION EXPORT BAN TILL MAR 31 T he ban on export of onion will continue till its previously announced deadline of March 31 as the government is keen to keep prices under check and ensure domestic availability, Consumer Affairs Secretary Rohit Kumar Singh said on Tuesday. The government had, on December 8, 2023, banned the export of onion till March 31. “Ban on onion exports has not been lifted. It is in force and there is no change in the status,” Singh said. Following the announcement, the price of onion fell on Tuesday by Rs150 per quintal at the Lasalgaon mandi in Nashik. NIFTY SCALES LIFETIME HIGH T he Sensex spurted by 349 points while Nifty scaled a fresh lifetime high on the sixth straight day of gains on Tuesday, driven by buying in banking and select FMCG shares. The 30-share BSE Sensex reversed its early losses and closed higher by 349.24 points or 0.48 per cent at 73,057.40 in a volatile trade. As many as 18 Sensex shares closed in the green while 12 settled in the red. The broader Nifty of the NSE rose further by 74.70 points or 0.34 per cent to close at a new record level of 22,196.95. Intra-day, the 50share index touched lifetime high of 22,215.60. 50% return increasing MSP of 22 crops Jarange-Patil calls it a ‘fraud on the Marathas’, to escalate stir Maharashtra state legislature on Tuesday unanimously passed Maratha reservation Bill 2024. Now onwards Marathas will get 10 percent reservation in education and jobs in government and semi government sectors in Maharashtra. However, Maratha activist Manoj Jarange-Patil, because of whose agitation the state government was forced to grant reservation, declared the bill a fraud on Marathas. He had demanded inclusion of Marathas in the OBC category He has decided . to escalate his agitation. The bill was based on the report of the Justice Shukre (Retd) -led Backward Class Commission (BCC) report which had supported the demand for reservation for Marathas. An important aspect was that Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray thanked CM Eknath Shinde for getting the bill passed. Mr Shinde had politically stabbed Mr Thackeray in the back and brought down his government. Ever since then the ties between the two have been extremely bitter. But for the first time in many months, Mr Thackeray softened his attitude towards his arch rival leading to speculation about a thaw in their relationship. The bill has not touched OBC quota at all and has given separate reservation to Maratha community The Bill . has violated the 50% cap placed by the Supreme Court (SC) for the reservation but the state feels that it has made out a strong case for Maratha reservation. However, government has not taken any decision on the inclusion of Sage-Soyare (Close and distant relatives) because around six lakhs suggestions have been submitted with the government by the public and after scrutiny of those suggestions cabinet the will take the decision. On Tuesday morning CM Shinde, who is a Maratha, called a meeting of his cabinet and tabled the BCC report and got it endorsed. Thereafter, around 1 PM he tabled the bill in the state assembly for approval. CONTD. ON NATION SUICIDE IN POLICE STATION Nashik cop turns gun on himself MEGHA KUCHIK / MUMBAI Police Inspector Ashok Najan (40) shot himself at Ambad police station in Nashik City on Tuesday morning firing a single round. Najan, the second in charge inspector at the station, arrived for duty in the morning, had a brief, routine, discussion with his colleagues and went into his cabin. Then a gunshot was heard, prompting all in the police personnel in the station to run to- wards the sound. Najan was discovered lying dead on his chair, blood pooling around him. He had shot himself in the head. Delhi Chalo stand-off deepens RAJESH MOUDGIL CHANDIGARH Tension gripped Haryana borders as swarms of protesting farmers from Punjab readied to head to Delhi on Wednesday to press for their demands including MSP for their crops and loan waivers, even as their number swelled. Several farmers came in modified tractors and other heavy earth-moving machines such as Poclain machines and JCBs to the Shambhu barrier to remove barricade put up by Haryana police. Many farmers could also be seen readying their makeshift body armour so as to ward off rubber bullets. The Haryana police, for their part, also increased security measures and had installed ``sound canon’’ to stop and disperse the protesting farmers. It may be recalled that the sound cannon or Long Range Acoustic Devices (LRAD) is a specialised loudspeaker that produces highly shrill sounds to disperse the crowds. The situation turned grim since Monday night after the farmer leaders rejected the Centre’s offer of legal guarantee for five crops – maize, cotton and three pulses – after their fourth meeting with the government. CONTD. ON NATION No one has an explanation of what led to this. Upon receiving information about the incident, senior police officers including Sandip Karnik (Police Commissioner of Nashik) Prashant Bachhva (Deputy Commissioner of Crime Branch), Monika Raut (Deputy Commissioner of Police), Shekhar Deshmukh (Assistant Police Commissioner), and Dilip Thakur (Senior Police Inspector), arrived at the scene. CONTD. ON NATION ‘Article 370 biggest hurdle’ Jammu: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said Article 370, which granted special status to Jammu and Kashmir and was abrogated in 2019, was the biggest hurdle in the development of the erstwhile state. Modi also said that after the abrogation of Article 370, Jammu and Kashmir, which is now a Union Territory has wit, nessed balanced development across regions and in all sectors. Addressing a rally after launching multiple projects worth over Rs 32,000 crore for Jammu and Kashmir and projects worth Rs 13,500 crore for other parts of the country he also , said the government has reached people's doorstep in Jammu and Kashmir the first time. REPORT NATION Man dies trying to fix his smile OUR BUREAU / HYDERABAD His marriage had been fixed. Not his smile. To have this done, 28-year-old Laxmi Narayana Vinjam went to a dental clinic for a smile redesigning procedure. He fell unconscious on the dentist's chair never to recover. This is apparently what happened at FMS International Dental Clinic at Road No.37, Jubilee Hills on Monday: According to police, Laxmi Narayana went to the clin- ic for a smile-designing procedure and he fell unconscious immediately after being given anesthesia. He was then rushed to a private hospital in the city , where he was declared dead on arrival. Lakshmi Narayana's parents came to know their son was dead after the hospital staff informed them. Their had not kept them in the loop of the procedure he was to undergo. The parents lodged a com- plaint with the Jubilee Hills police charging the dental clinic and the dentist responsible for administering excessive anesthesia, leading to his untimely death. Based on the complaint, a case has been registered against the dental clinic under the IPC section 304 (A) for culpable homicide not amounting to murder and an investigation is on. Laxmi Narayana had no other medical issues, his family members told police. THOUGHT CONTROL OVER MOUSE CLICK Musk’s brain chip turns brainy chip IANS / NEW DELHI Elon Musk has said that the first human implanted with a brain chip from his braincomputer interface company Neuralink seems to have fully recovered and is able to control a computer mouse using thoughts. "Progress is good, and the patient seems to have made a full recovery with neural ef, fects that we are aware of. The patient is able to move a Scan for more information MARATHA QUOTA BILL PASSED KALPESH MHAMUNKAR MUMBAI mouse around the screen by just thinking," Musk said in a Spaces event on X. The tech billionaire also mentioned that Neuralink is now attempting to get as many mouse button clicks as possible from the patient. Following approval for human trial recruitment in September last year, the company successfully implanted a chip into its first human patient last month. Musk said that the compa- ny's first product, called Telepathy , would bring control of a phone or computer just by thinking. In November last year, the brain-computer interface company raised an additional $43 million in venture capital, according to a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The filing showed that the company raised its previous tranche, led by Peter Thiel's Founders Fund, from $280 million to $323 million in early August. However well-intentioned, medical interventions can produce unintended consequences, reports Live Science. Scientists and ethicists are particularly concerned about the potential for identity theft, password hacking and blackmail. Given how the devices access users' thoughts, there is also the possibility that their autonomy could be manipulated by third parties. cbc 22201/13/0270/2324 Modi Sarkar ki Guarantee r Prosperous Farmers, Prosperous Country Manoj Jarange-Patil gets the saline drip removed in a sign of displeasure over the Maratha quota vote on Tuesday SC quashes earlier result, AAP candidate is mayor OUR BUREAU / NEW DELHI The Supreme Court on Tuesday quashed the decision by Returning Officer (RO) Anil Masih to declare a BJP candidate as Chandigarh Mayor on January 30 and declared Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) candidate Kuldeep Kumar to be the winner of the mayoral polls instead. In the process, the Supreme Court Bench rejected Masih's explanation on why he had declared the eight votes for AAP candidate to be invalid. "The eight votes which were treated as invalid by making those markings ... counting the 8 votes for the petitioner (AAP candidate Kumar) will make him have 20 votes. We direct that the election result by the presiding officer is quashed. The AAP candidate is declared to be the winner of Show cause issued to Returning Officer for unlawfully altering course of Chandigarh mayoral polls the Chandigarh mayoral polls," the Court ordered, reports Bar and Bench. The Court issued a show cause to Masih, observing that he had “unlawfully altered the course of the mayoral election" and that he had made statement before the Court that was a "patent falsehood." The Court was hearing a petition filed by AAP Councillor Kuldeep Kumar who alleged fraud in Masih's decision to declare BJP Manoj Sonkar (since resigned) as the Chandigarh Mayor on January 30. CONTD. ON NATION Congress, SP set to part ways in UP BISWAJEET BANERJEE LUCKNOW Seat-sharing negotiations between the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Congress in Uttar Pradesh has almost collapsed, in a significant setback to the INDIA bloc ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. The bone of contention is three seats of Amroha, Bijnore and Moradabad that Congress wants, with people familiar with the developments saying that the SP is reluctant to part with these constituencies. The inability of the two parties to come to an agree- ment over the allocation of seats is being viewed as a collapse of the alliance, though there has been no official confirmation about this. “I have not received any communication from the Samajwadi Party, so I cannot comment on whether the alliance is terminated. The final call is to be taken by the high command,” said Congress state president Ajai Rai. Earlier, the SP had proposed to allocate 17 seats to the Congress, after initially offering 11 seats. CONTD. ON NATION