Junior Digest

Pasighat (Arunachal) : Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju today said there had been reports of the Chinese army transgressing into Arunachal Pradesh on two occasions recently.

One incident was reported from Kibithu area in remote Anjaw district on July 22 and another at Thangsa in Tawang district in the same month, the minister told reporters here after inaugurating the Pasighat Advance Landing Ground.

Rijiju said he was not describing these as acts of incursion, but transgression.

“We cannot term it as incursion, but transgression as the Chinese army just crossed the perceived area along the Line of Actual Control,” he said.

He said when the matter was reported from Kibithu by the ITBP, the Centre verified it and found that it was only an act of transgression.

Asked about the government’s efforts to match China’s infrastructure development across the border, the Union minister said the Centre had already begun strengthening infrastructure across the border and the ALG at Pasighat was a major step in this direction.

“We are not challenging or competing with any other country by strengthening our border infrastructure. We will have to build robust infrastructure to strengthen our defence and whatever we did is because India is an emerging power with capability. So IAF should have operational bases in all the bordering states,” he said.

He said the NDA government at the Centre attached priority to development of border infrastructure.

Asked about the proposed ALG at Tawang, the minister said an area had been identified between Tawang and Lumla at an altitude of 11,000 feet and the height in such a rugged terrain was very challenging.

“We will have to see whether the site is feasible or will have to look for an alternative,” he said.

When his attention was drawn to the civilian terminal at the ALG at Pasighat which is yet to be constructed, Rijiju said three locations were identified and he would discuss the matter with the Airport Authority of India and the Union Civil Aviation Ministry.

New Delhi : Woman gymnast Dipa Karmakar, who created history by entering the vault final at the Rio Olympics before finishing fourth, and ace shooter Jitu Rai were today recommended for the prestigious Rajiv Khel Ratna Award by the selection panel appointed by the Sports Ministry.

Dipa got the nod of the 12-member committee, which met here today, on the basis of her stupendous performance in Rio although the deadline for sending in the recommendation to the Sports Ministry was already over.

The 23-year-old Tripura-born gymnast became an overnight sensation after she finished fourth in the women’s vault final on August 14, missing the the bronze by a mere 0.150 points.

She had won bronze medal in the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.

Jitu, on the other hand, was ranked third in the world in the men’s 10m air pistol. He was one of two Indian shooters to make the final of their respective events in Rio, the other being Abhinav Bindra.

The 28-year-old Rai entered the final of the men’s 10m air pistol before ending up eighth but could not advance to the same stage in the 50m pistol, his pet event, in the Rio Games.

This year, Rai has won the silver medal in the 10m air pistol event at the ISSF World Cup in Baku, Azerbaijan and the gold medal at the ISSF World Cup in Bangkok in 50m pistol. He was the first shooter to qualify for Rio Games after winning a silver medal at the World Championships in Spain in 2014.

Any sportsperson who wins a medal in their sport in the remaining days of the ongoing Rio Olympics will be included among those recommended for Khel Ratna, according to sources.

An Olympic medal has also been treated at par with medals in the World Championships.

Indian Test cricket captain Virat Kohli’s name was also discussed but the likes of Dipa and Jitu were preferred since this is an Olympic year, the sources said.

Kohli also missed out because the government wants to keep a few slots open in case the likes of shuttler P V Sindhu, who has reached the semifinals in the Rio Games, wins a medal.

Rajiv Khel Ratna is given to the sportsperson who has produced spectacular and outstanding performance in the last four years and it carries a cash amount of Rs 7.5 lakh.

The Khel Ratna winner (s) will receive the award from President Pranab Mukherjee on National Sports Day on August 29.

Woman tennis star Sania Mirza is the last recipient of the award in 2015.

New Delhi : Former Australian great Greg Chappell feels that coaching Indian cricket team for two years was a “bit more complicated” than he would have apprehended as there are “so many layers to life in India”.

“It was perhaps a little bit more complicated than anyone could have imagined. There were so many layers to life in India, let alone cricket. That was pretty hard to expect anyone to master, particularly an outsider,” Chappell told ESPN Cricinfo in an interview.

Chappell had a tumultous two years at helm during which he famously fell out with erstwhile skipper Sourav Ganguly and also did not share a great rapport with a lot of senior players.

Asked to reflect back on his time, Chappell drew the analogy comparing the popularity of Indian superstar cricketers with that of iconic Beatles who also had a crazy following during 1960’s upto early 1970’s.

“Being with the Indian cricket team was what it must have been like travelling with the Beatles. It was remarkable the way they were feted around the country wherever they went. Big crowds gathered at airports. The whole airport would come to a standstill.

“To see it from the inside and to understand some of the pressures on the players. It wasn’t an easy thing to be an Indian cricketer, especially a renowned Indian cricketer. The expectations, the interruptions to their day-to-day lives, and the restrictions on their ability to move freely – I marvelled at the way they managed to absorb all of that and just get on with it,” Chappell tried to explain the pressures of being an Indian cricketer.

The former Australian captain also opined that the team he coached had more depth in terms of talent than the ones he played against in the 1970’s and early 1980’s.

“The one that I coached had more depth in talent. There was a lot of talent in the teams we played against in the top half a dozen players, but then it dropped away a bit. More from an experience and a belief point of view rather than a lack of talent.

“The Indian teams that I coached, on paper, had one of the best batting line-ups that any Test team could boast. Not many that outshone it as far as talent was concerned. The depth of talent in that group was extraordinary.”

But Chappell did say that he does not know whether that group which had some modern day greats like Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman achieved a lot or not.

“I don’t know that they got the best out of the group that they had. Other teams probably got more out of the talent they had,” he said.

“There are a number of reasons for that. Partly because they didn’t have the bowling attack to make the most of that batting line-up. Away from India it didn’t do as well as it probably should have done.

New Delhi : The Supreme Court today said that youth below 18 years of age cannot participate in the Dahi Handi ritual, part of the Janmashtami festival, in Maharashtra and the height of the human pyramid for it cannot exceed 20 feet, a limit fixed by the Bombay High Court.

A bench comprising justices A R Dave and L Nageswara Rao, which decided to hear the revived petition in October this year, however suspended the operation of two other directions passed by the High Court to regulate the Dahi Handi festival.

The High Court directions, which have been suspended by the apex court, relate to amending the existing law to bar children below 18 years of age from participating in dangerous performances.

It also suspended the direction pertaining to 15 days prior approval from the authorities concerned to check the date of birth certificates of ‘Govindas’ to ensure that no underage children take part in it.

During the hearing, the bench agreed with the High Court directions with regard to the minimum age of participants and the maximum height of the pyramid.

The Supreme Court had, on August 10, revived a plea challenging a Bombay HC order restricting the height of human pyramids to 20 feet for ‘Dahi-Handi’ ritual, saying it needs to hear the PIL petitioner before passing any order.

The court had sought reply of Swati Sayaji Patil, a social worker, who had filed a petition for initiation of contempt proceedings against Maharashtra government in high court for failure to comply with the HC order.

The Maharashtra government had earlier approached the apex court seeking clarification on its 2014 order by which it had stayed the high court decision banning participation of those below 18-years in a popular ‘Dahi-Handi’ ritual.

The high court had on August 11, 2014, while hearing a petition filed by Patil, ordered that the height of human pyramids should not exceed 20 feet and that children below the age of 18 years should not be allowed to participate.

The state government had then challenged the high court order in the Supreme Court which had initially suspended the HC order and later dismissed the petition challenging it.

The Maharashtra government had taken a stand that since the apex court had not expressed any opinion on restriction imposed by the HC on the height of human pyramids, it was not bound by its earlier order.

The high court, however, had asked the state government to seek clarification from the Supreme Court on the aspect that its earlier order would be in force unless it had been set aside by the apex court.

Mumbai: Filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan has slammed the idea of censorship in films.

The director said he feels to have censorship in a democracy is “silly” and such rules can only survive in dictatorship.

“I don’t believe in any censorship. I don’t want to be told what to do and what not to do. It is very silly in a democracy. Only under dictatorship you need censorship of any kind,” he told reporters here.

“What is it that you are censoring? An opinion. But democracy functions on different opinions…,” he added.

According to the filmmaker, he was once part of a film study group, which included directors like Shyam Benegal and Ramesh Sippy, where they discussed the issue of censorship.

“There should be no censorship in a democracy. I am basically against the idea. In fact, we were all together in a committee which was studying all these issues, it was a film study group, under the chairmanship of doctor Shivaram Karanth.

“Shyam Benegal, Ramesh Sippy and others were there.

Majority of us decided that we should scrap this (censorship).

Then Mr Sippy said no please don’t do that. We save ourselves with the censor certificate.”

The 75-year-old “Swayamvaram” helmer said censor certificate can be used by filmmakers as a way to safely release a film during crisis.

“Suppose on the day of the release or on previous day, somebody goes to the court and if the release is disturbed, so now what helps them is the censor certificate. They can show them, that it has been censored and approved. That kind of security is being given by this certificate.

“But the idea of censorship doesn’t stop there. That’s the problem. When somebody becomes in-charge of the censor board and thinks that he has supreme authority over everyone, who makes films in this country, that means it is the misuse of what is intended by certification, it is not even censorship,” he added.