AV 26th March 2022

FIRST & FOREMOST ASIAN WEEKLY IN EUROPE

Your ambition..

Our expertise e.

Legal advice you can trustt Pragnesh P gnesh h hwadia Modhw Mo

Partner Man Managing

Diversity and Inclusivity : More needs to be done

R

SEE PAGE - 16-17

26 MARCH - 1 APRIL2022

07

Let noble thoughts come to us from every side

13 ‘Time is Muscle’

Parents of student killed in Clerkenwell pay tribute

+44 (0) 20 0 8951 6989 enquiri nquiries@axiomdwfm.com @axiomdwfm.com axiomdwfm.com

VOL 50 - ISSUE 46

25

28

PM Modi remains world's most popular leader

Priyanka-Nick celebrate a 'lit' Holi at LA home

IS BRITAIN

Sadhguru launches 100-day motorbike trip to promote ‘Save Soil’ campaign

INCLUSIVE? Sadhguru touching Gandhiji’s feet to seek his blessings

On Monday London's Parliament Square was the start off point for Sadhguru's 30,000-km and 100day motorbike tour. He said to those present, “For the next 100 days, the world must reverberate with one energy with one purpose to Save Soil. Talk soil, sing soil, breathe soil, live soil. Let’s make it happen.

Be with me.”

For full story see page 04.

Panellists urge women to keep going with purpose and motivation Rupanjana Dutta Kemi Badenoch MP

PM Boris Johnson

Last year Dr Tony Sewell’s report almost denied there was any institutional racism in Britain. It was heavily criticised by everyone from journalists to politicians to campaigners. Many distanced themselves from it, calling it far from reality. Last week’s publication of the responseto the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities (CRED) report, after one year of silence, still quite cleverly ignores the report’s most catastrophic conclusions.

Continued on page 06

RAF personnel with panelists Bottom row L-R: Rumer, Sangeeta Waldron, CB Patel-Chairman ABPL Group, Gp Capt Joanne Swainston, Sam Ubhi and Sahera Chohan

The second annual Women in Conversation networking event and panel discussion was hosted

by Asian Voice and Gujarat Samachar on Friday 18 March 2022 in association with the Royal Air Force.

The theme for the panel discussion was ‘charting the unknown and breaking stereotypes’.

For full story see page 08.

02

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

with Keith Vaz

Family-run firm increases output by switching to four-day-week

DIVYANSH CHOPRA Student Divyansh is a student at Jai Hind College studying Humanities. He is currently an Intern at a Film Production House- Sundial Entertainment in Mumbai.

Divyansh is interested in world issues and attends many “Model United Nations” (MUN) Conferences discussing various current issues and finding the best resolution to it in the United Nations Format, he has won a few national and international Debates. He hopes to be the Prime Minister of India someday. When Divyansh is not away at College, he likes spending quality time with his parents Dharmendra and Mamta and sister Divya.

1) Which place, or city or country do you most feel at home in?

I don’t believe in that; the whole world is my home. There is no city or country which I can call my home, cause that’s a variable, the only thing permanent in my home should be love for all.

2) What are your proudest achievements?

I was in my home town – Borivali (Mumbai), India and there was a big ground with heaps of garbage just opposite our house. No one believed that it was going to change. I and my sisters proved them wrong. I have some international awards too, but this is my proudest achievement, cause here’s when I really brought a change.

3) What inspires you?

Constant efforts by other people to help to create a better world. They give me hope and strength.

4) What has been biggest obstacle in your career?

I actually don’t have a real career right now, but I definitely know what is going to be the biggest obstacle – The inactiveness of people in supporting change.

5) Who has been the biggest influence on your career to date?

The biggest influence on me has been my uncle, Mr. Mahaveer Jain. His life is very influential and shall be instrumental in my career.

6) What is the best aspect about your current role?

The best aspect about being a student and an intern, is being able to observe and learn from each and every one and having the power to shape and improve your own career.

7) And the worst?

Being able to manage studies and internship is definitely the most difficult part.

8) What are your long term goals?

I would just say that I am a currently a student on a mission to create a better world and aim to improve the lives of people via any and all mediums possible.

9) If you were Prime Minister, what one aspect would you change?

The way the leaders are elected in my country. I would want to champion a revamp in the way elections take place in our country and the way the campaigns take place during these elections. I feel it is the root to all the irregularities and challenges in the system.

10) If you were marooned on a desert island, which historical figure would you like to spend your time with and why.

Maximilien Robespierre. In the 1700s, he was the guy who abolished slavery. He was a revolutionary far beyond his time. I want to hear his ideology and reasoning for all the changes he brought in the world.

Some parents may not be able to send children to school due to fuel price hike The price of petrol and diesel has reached record levels due to the ongoing conflict between Ukraine and Russia with the cost to fill up a family car now surpassing £90 for the first time.

The rising fuel costs means some parents could be forced to teach their children from home, an MP has warned.

Drivers could soon have

to pay £2.40 for a litre of petrol and £3 for diesel as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine sends prices soaring.

Tory MP Jake Berry, chairman of the Northern Research Group of Conservative backbenchers, grilled Mr Sunak on the cost of fuel during in the House of Commons.

The continuing rise in the price of fuel comes amid warnings of potential global

FINANCIAL A SERVICES MORTGAGES Residential Buy to Let Remortgages

PROTECTION Life Insurance Critical Illness Income Protection

Please conta act:

Dinesh S Shonchhatra Mortgage Ad dviser

Call: 020 8424 C 4 8686 / 07956 810647 77 High Street, Wealdston ne, Harrow, HA3 5DQ mortgage@majorestate.co om ~ majorestate.com

oil supply problems.

Nathan Piper, head of oil and gas research at financial services company Investec, warned that drivers ‘need to get ready for what could be continued increases in fuel prices.’ He added: ‘If more stringent actions are imposed upon Russia, and five million barrels a day is truly taken out of the market, then oil prices would really have no ceiling.’

Chilwell Products, based in Stanton by Dale, Derbyshire - which manufactures scaffold board end bands - said it had seen a 12% increase in volumes over the past year.

It said it had made Friday a permanent day off, while staff retained full pay.

Ms Clarke, 30, who is the granddaughter of the company's founder Derrick

Telford, said she was a firm believer in work-rest balance. She took on the business from her mother Lorraine Clarke in 2019 and said she had written into employee contracts they would not have to work on Fridays or weekends.

Salaries of employees at the firm have remained the same, despite staff working

five hours fewer every week.

According to the Chartered Institute of Professional Development the moves to reduce working hours without compromising pay were "undoubtedly positive". However, such steps needed to be supported by other changes to ensure they did not result in employee stress.

Man slashed on head at Sheffield cemetery A 44-year-old man was at Tinsley Park Cemeteryin Sheffield at 10.30am on Sunday, 13 March, when he was approached by a man who ordered him to empty his pockets.

When he replied that he only had his car keys, the

man brandished a small, brown-handled machete, slashed the victim on the head and then ran away.

The suspect is described as a white male in his late 20s, around 6ft 6ins tall, with short black curly hair.

It is thought he was wearing

a black zip-up hoodie and blue jeans during the attack.

Anyone who can help officers with their investigation is urged to call 101 by South Yorkshire Police, who are now appealing for witnesses to the assault to come forward.

Covid hospital patients rise in North London Many north London hospitals saw consecutive rises in daily Covid patient counts over the first week of March, new data reveals.

A combined 60 patients were recorded by the trust which runs Northwick Park, St Mark's, Central Middlesex and Ealing hospitals on March 8, which was up from 54 seven days earlier.

The Royal Free London hospital trust recorded a combined 95 confirmed Covid patients, including 18 people on ventilators, on March 8 – the same numbers as the previous Tuesday.

Homerton University Hospital recorded a total of 30 Covid patients on March 8, including two people on

ventilators.The combined count was 21, with four on ventilation, a week earlier.

The trust's Whittington Hospital was treating 57 Covid patients on March 8, compared to 66 on previous Tuesday. There were no patients on ventilators on the most recent date, after one was recorded on March 1.

UK now has highest Civil Servant officials According to the latest Office for National Statistics figures show, there are now 475,000 civil servants – based on full-time equivalent numbers. The headcount has now reached its highest level in more than a decade, continuing its growth since the EU referendum in June 2016.

This is a rise of 2,000 compared to the end of

September and an increase of 34,000 from the end of 2020.

Under then-Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude, the civil service had shrank from around 480,000 full-time officials in 2010 to about 384,000 just before the 2016 EU referendum.

Ministers outlined plans in the 2021 Spending Review

to reduce the non-frontline roles civil service headcount to pre-pandemic levels by 2023-24 “to drive out inefficient spend to ensure taxpayers’ money is focused on priorities” and fund more frontline roles.

Most of the rise in recent years has come in London, despite a pledge to move 22,000 jobs out of the capital.

Queen made disapproving remarks at Kate-William’s wedding

Prince William and Kate Middleton 's royal wedding was a joyous day for Brits and people all over the world, but not least William's grandparents - the Queen and Prince Philip.

The engineering lecturer Zekarias Haile, 51, lives near They beamed with as they Manchester Airport in Wythenshawe, found a random pride watched their Range Rover parked on his driveway.

He was forced to wait four whole days for the driv- grandson, who is second in line for er to finally pick it up.

According to police the matter was not a criminal the throne, tie the offence, but said homeowners could approach the knot with his university girlfriend council and take civil action.

According to Haile, 'My worry now is that, because Kate.

Wills and Kate I couldn’t do anything about it, it will happen again.

There are rogue parking firms who claim they are were joined by their meet and greet and just park in our area. It’s a viola- families and many tion of my private property.' The business potential celebrity and VIP from parking has even led some homeowners to rent guests, while millions tuned in live, out their driveways for a quick buck. to see the momen-

Random car parked in someone's driveway for four days

tous occasion unfold at London's Westminster Abbey. Fortunately, the day went perfectly, and even the Queen was impressed, turning to Prince Philip after the ceremony to say "it was excellent," a lip reader has confirmed.

However, there was one element of the day that she wasn't a fan of, after a lip reader confirmed her disapproving remarks to her husband."I wanted them to take the smaller carriage," she said, before Camilla jumped in and said: "It all went very well."

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

03

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

Thought for the week

A glimpse of hope?

In a phone call to Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Tuesday, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi makes it clear that India is deeply committed to Ukraine’s humanitarian situation while Mr Johnson insisted that India should intensify efforts to promote peace and de-escalation in the region. The leaders welcomed India and the UK’s strong and prosperous relationship, and agreed to continue to build on trade, security and business ties in the coming weeks and months.

PM Johnson who came under controversy for comparing Brexit to Ukraine fighting off Russian invasion sparked anger among Opposition leaders.

While Mr Johnson has been moving around from one dictator to another, The Good Law project in a statement said that the Government has admitted that none of Boris Johnson’s messages from his mobile phone prior to April 2021 are available. As Good Law Project challenges in Court Ministers’ persistent use of private communication channels such as email, messaging apps and SMS to conduct Government business, instances of the Prime Minister refusing to make some of his WhatsApp communications available have previously been disclosed (such as during the investigation into the redecoration of his Downing Street apartment), this is the first time that the Government has admitted none of his messages prior to April 2021 are available to be searched.

At the same time, Britain published the action plan to fight racism in the UK and a compensation scheme to pay sub-postmasters who helped uncover the Post Office IT scandal but missed out on full compensation pay outs.

With 'Inclusive Britain’ plan (see P1), the government has released strategy highlighting the details of 74 actions that are aimed at tackling racial disparities across the country. The report was developed as a response to last year's controversial report by the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities which made 24 recommendations to tackle ethnic disparities. Some of the actions set out by the Inclusive Britain strategy includes Trust, tackling online abuse, communication – stopping the use of the term BAME, a new national framework for Police force, bridging ethnicity pay gap, to expand support to families affected by multiple and complex problems and inclusion.

Though the report seems to still not acknowledge

the existence of institutional racism in Britain affecting several existential disparities, the effort to take correct measures is a move in the right direction by this government. In the meantime, Chancellor Rishi Sunak is expected to unveil Spring Statement that promises to build a stronger, more secure economy for the UK. He is meant to set out further plans to support people with the rise in cost of living and pledge to continue to “stand by” hard-working families during the challenging times ahead.

He will say that freedom and democracy remain the best route to peace, prosperity, and happiness and that a strong economy is fundamental in enabling us to counter the threat Russia poses to our values.

Alongside Britain continuing its “unwavering” support to Ukraine, he will add that a stronger economy is vital in responding to the threat of President Putin and that freedom and democracy remain the best route to peace, prosperity, and happiness.

The Chancellor’s statement is expected to set out how the government plans to create a new culture of enterprise, with the private sector training more, investing more, and innovating more.

The Spring Statement will also build on government support worth around £21 billion this year and next to help families with the cost of living. That includes the £9.1 billion Energy Bills Rebate, putting an average of £1,000 more per year into the pockets of working families via changes to Universal Credit and freezing fuel and alcohol duties to keep costs down.

The National Living Wage will be increased to £9.50 per hour from April, meaning people working full time on the National Living Wage will see a £1,000 increase in their annual earnings. And the Government’s Plan for Jobs is meant to help people into work and giving them the skills, they need to progress – the best approach to managing the cost of living in the long term.

However, with plans and hopes ahead, two years since the first lockdown in 2020, as Covid cases increase, a leading medical expert has warned that the Government must not turn a blind eye, after the Health Secretary claimed ‘There’s no particular cause for concern’ over soaring Covid cases. 1 in 20 Brits currently have Covid, immunity has tumbled among triple-jabbed care home residents and long Covid may hit up to 30% of the population. We don’t want to go back to the drawing board again!

Investment climate in India brightens As the Indian economy is high on the path of economic recovery, Japan and Australia announce huge investments in the country. While Japan announced an investment of 5 trillion yen or £32 billion over the next five years, Australia pledged an investment of £150 million in multiple sectors. Japanese PM Fumio Kishida made the statement while addressing a joint press conference with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi.

The Japanese PM said that the deal is expected to boost the bilateral trade between the two countries. The Japanese investments in India touched $32 billion between 2000 and 2019, mainly in the automobile, electrical equipment, telecommunications, chemical, insurance and pharmaceutical sectors. Japan has also been supporting infrastructure development in India, including a high-speed rail project. The bilateral trade between India and Japan for 2019-20 crossed $11.87 billion, according to government data. India’s exports to Japan amounted to $3.94 billion while India’s imports from Japan stood at $7.93 billion. The Australian PM Scott Morrison announced the investment at a bilateral summit with PM Modia. India and Australia has also signed an MoU in the field of critical minerals, which will help and increase access of India to acquire metallic coal and lithium from Australia. According to a news agency, India and Australia will conclude a trade agreement by the end of this month.

Meanwhile, India's tax collections on personal and corporate income jumped over 48 per cent in the current fiscal after a 41 per cent surge in advance tax payments, mirroring sustained economic recovery in a year that witnessed two waves of coronavirus infections. Net collections of direct taxes until March 16, 2022, in the fiscal year that started on April 1, 2021, stood at Rs 13.63 trillion compared to Rs 9.18 trillion in the same period a year back, an official statement said.

The net collections in direct taxes, which is made up of income tax on individual income, corporation tax on profits of companies, property tax, inheritance tax and gift tax, in the current fiscal is 35 per cent higher than the collection of Rs 9.56 trillion in the pre-pandemic year of 2019-20 (April 2019 to March 2020). Advance tax collections, the fourth instalment of which was due

on March 15, rose to Rs 6.62 trillion, up 40.75 per cent, the statement said, adding refunds aggregating to Rs 1.87 trillion have been issued in the current fiscal.

Almost 53 per cent of all direct tax collection was from corporate tax, while 47 per cent came from personal income tax, including securities transaction tax (STT) on shares.

Moody's Investors Service, meanwhile, raised India's growth forecast to 9.5 per cent for the calendar year 2022 and to 8.4 per cent for the coming fiscal beginning April 1, even as it flagged high oil prices and supply distortions as a drag on growth. Stating that the economic recovery from the first and second Covid wave in 2020 and 2021, respectively, has been stronger than expected, Moody's said GST collection, retail activity and Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) suggest 'solid momentum'. ''We have raised our 2022 calendar year growth forecast for India to 9.5 per cent from 7 per cent, and maintained our forecast for 5.5 per cent growth in 2023. This translates into 8.4 per cent and 6.5 per cent in fiscal years 2022-23 and 2023-24, respectively,'' Moody's said in an update. The speed of the recovery from the first lockdown-led contraction in the June quarter of 2020 and subsequently in the June quarter of 2021 during the Delta wave was stronger than expected.

The RBI governor Shaktikanta Das said the central bank will continue to ensure adequate liquidity to support the economy, which is facing many headwinds in the form of soaring crude oil and key commodity prices following the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Das said since the pandemic-hit the economy in March 2020, the central bank has pumped in a whopping £170 billion into the economy and assured the industry that the RBI will continue to ensure that the economy is well oiled with funds. The governor further said banks at the system level are in better health now with the capital adequacy ratio at 16 per cent, and gross NPAs falling to a record low of 6.5 per cent. He said despite the headwinds arising from the Russia-Ukraine war, the economy is better placed given the high forex reserves and low current account gap. The foreign direct investment is also rising, he said.

The bad news is time flies. The good news is you’re the pilot. — Michael Altshuler

Political Sketchbook Alpesh Patel

The power of the Indian Diaspora?

The Ukraine issue has had more prominence than the Kashmir issue.

Power they say is the ability to keep things off the agenda as much as on it. So how powerful is the global Indian diaspora, considering that business as much as politics has led the way on the Ukraine issue. In politics India has maintained it’s muted stance, beholden to Russian military deliveries as opposed to agreeing with the wanton death and invasion of Ukraine one assumes. I do not think it is churlishness to do with 1971.

As the Prime Minister of India, PM Modi awarded the country’s highest honour to overseas Indians recently, now is an excellent time to consider just how significant and influential these individuals are worldwide and what role they could have in shaping global peace, Indian development, and the country's relations with the West.

India has a vast global diaspora. It’s estimated around 18 million Indian people are living outside their country of birth. But what impact are these citizens of Indian heritage having around the world?

The US The Indian diaspora in the US has a powerful voice. They recently warned Joe Biden against appointing the controversial Masood Khan as an ambassador between the US and Pakistan.

Additionally, they spoke out over the vandalisation of a Gandhi statue in New York.

The Indian diaspora has had an enormous impact on contemporary US culture. Their role is celebrated in the collection of essays titled Kamala Harris and the Rise of Indian Americans.

The UK British Indians have had a positive influence on all areas of UK life, including sports. That contribution was celebrated by the India-UK week of sport in February.

British Indian voters could be instrumental during the next election in the UK. While traditionally, the Indian diaspora has voted Labour, there are signs that this is changing in recent years.Now, around 15% of the UK's British-Indian say they are undecided over their voting intentions. Who they decide to support could be significant, especially during a tight election. As Labour’s Kashmir obsessed minority seek to use the Party as a vessel for their sectarian religious interests, so British Indian voters move further away from Labour.

With trade deals and closer relationships post-Brexit, India has become deeply important to the UK's future.

Across the Globe India is actively forging solid relations with the West. Relations with the UK and US are advanced, but a German development partnership has been explored recently.

PM Modi recognises that the Indian diaspora is a "strategic asset".

As India's economy expands, PM Modi sees global Indians' potential to help growth and trade.

Indeed, all across the Indian diaspora, people are trying to find solutions to tackle inequality in the motherland. This commitment is seen in the form of support, funding, and leadership. Additionally, during the COVID crisis last year, many people of Indian heritage felt compelled to help the country through one of its darkest hours.

India can be a considerable player in shaping democracy in Asia.

China is a threat in the region, which was highlighted by the recent incident between a navy vessel and an Australian plane.India is a powerful strategic ally for the West. It will be essential to keep peace and boost security.

The relationship between India and the diaspora has several advantages on a business and technological level. With several young CEOs at the head of some of the biggest US tech companies and other citizens in positions of power, India has a "living bridge" to the rest of the world.

Conclusion The Indian diaspora can help drive sustainable development in the country. It has several benefits, like helping investment in the country.

However, India can take advantage of these citizens' knowledge, education, and cultural diversity to continue its remarkable rise.

Whatever the views on India’s perspective on Ukraine, the diaspora will not in anyway be hindered from stronger ties to the ancestral motherland. Ultimately values are too much in agreement to be divided or prized apart and the alternative is a totalitarian dictatorship of China or a religious theocracy of Pakistan – nuclear armed and dangerous as ever with a military junta always as ever in the wings to take over since the country was invented.

Asian Voice is published by

Asian Business Publications Ltd Units 207-208, Harrow Business Centre, 429-433 Pinner Road, North Harrow, Middlesex, HA1 4HN Tel: 020 7749 4080 • Fax: 020 7749 4081 Email: aveditorial@abplgroup.com Website: www.abplgroup.com Editor: CB Patel

04

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Sadhguru launches 100-day motorbike trip to promote ‘Save Soil’ campaign

T

o raise awareness about saving soil, India’s best-known spiritual leader Sadhguru or Jaggi Vasudev has set off on a 30,000 kms trip. To “Save Soil”, he has embarked on a 100-day motorbike journey from London through Europe and the Middle East to India.

During the trip, he is due to meet celebrities, environmentalists and influencers in dozens of countries along the way. The journey is part of his #SaveSoil campaign, which is calling on policymakers to make soil regeneration a priority.

According to the UN’s campaign against desertification, it can take 1,000 years to produce a few centimeters of soil. The UN has also said that a third of soil globally is degraded and more than 90 per cent could become degraded by 2050.

“I’m not a scientist, I’m not an environmentalist. I belong to the land, not to the lab, but I know there’s a soil crisis so I’m talking to as many heads of state, politicians, leaders, top scientists and influencers [as possible],” said Sadhguru.

The 64-year-old motorbike enthusiast and yoga guru will be joined by celebrities including the Colombian singer-songwriter Maluma, England rugby player Jonny Wilkinson and German footballer Michael Ballack at public events in cities including Amsterdam, Berlin, Geneva and Tel Aviv.

Sadhguru is a proponent of Hindu spirituality and has been teaching yoga in southern India since 1982. In 1992, he established the Isha Foundation near Coimbatore, which operates an ashram and yoga center that provides educational activities. He is the author of several books and a frequent speaker at international forums. In 2017, he received the Padma Vibhushan, India’s second-highest civilian award, for his contributions to social welfare.

Before leaving London, Sadhguru met several key people from the community and attended events and visited temples.

Visit to Neasden Temple Sadhguru visited BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, London (popularly known as ‘Neasden Temple’), on Saturday 19 March 2022. He was received at the ceremonial gates by trustees of the Mandir and then greeted with a traditional welcome by Yogvivekdas Swami, Head Swami of the Mandir, on behalf of Mahant Swami Maharaj, the spiritual leader of BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha.

After paying his respects at the shrines in the upper sanctum and lower sanctum, Sadhguru met with members of the Hindu community and engaged with volunteers at the Mandir to understand some of its outreach work, such as the relief efforts during the Covid-19 pandemic and BAPS’s response to the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.

A special evening assembly was held in the presence of Sadhguru, attended by Lord Rami Ranger CBE, Bob Blackman MP, Virendra Sharma MP, and several other leaders of Hindu temples and associations.

During an interactive dialogue, Sadhguru explained his global ‘Save Soil’ campaign and elaborated upon his incredible solo motorbike journey from London to the Kaveri in India – 30,000 kilometres across 25 nations in 100 days – to raise awareness about the need to increase the organic content in cultivable soil.

Sadhguru also paid tribute to the Mandir’s charitable community services: “When humans are committed to do something beyond their own life, they can achieve something which is beyond imagination.

That is what I see here [at the Mandir].”

Sharing his impressions of his visit, Sadhguru spoke of the “enormous amount of dedication, focus and devotion” taken to create this “exquisite” Mandir, and paid tribute to the legacy of His Holiness Pramukh

Sadhguru at the Neasden Temple

Swami Maharaj by reflecting on the many people who attend and make use of the Mandir, “fulfilling the purpose [behind the creation of the Mandir by Pramukh Swami Maharaj].” He also drew upon the lasting impact of the activities undertaken by BAPS across the UK and Europe. “These are things that will live forever and inspire people for a long time to come.”

Nitin Palan, a lead volunteer at Neasden Temple, added, “It was an honour to welcome Sadhguruji and support his important global campaign. Here in communities across the UK, BAPS will be doing our bit, too. As a part of Pramukh Swami Maharaj’s centennial birth anniversary this year, we are contributing to the ‘Queen’s Green Canopy’ project by encouraging households to plant a tree at their home. We wish Sadhguruji all the best in his mission of raising vital awareness about saving our soil.”

India's 75th year of independence.

Before setting off on his bike tour, at the Indian High Commission he told those present, "It's extremely important that we act now. I've been talking about this for over 24 years, but solutions can only come when there is positive policy in every nation. He said, over 300,000 farmers have committed suicide in the last 20 years. Not just in India, across the world this is happening... one of the main concerns is soil depletion.”

Sadhguru with Indian High Commissioner HE Gaitri Issar Kumar, Lord Rami Ranger, Lord Karan Bilimoria, Lord Jitesh Gadhia, Bob Blackman MP, Rohit Vadhwana, Rohit Vadhwana, First Secretary (Economic), High Commission of India, Ashok Chauhan and others

Visit to Lord Basaveshwara's statue Sadhguru paid an official tribute to Lord Basaveshwara's statue in London on 21 March. He was welcomed at the statue by the former Mayor of London Borough of Lambeth, Dr. Neeraj Patil Sadhguru said, “Our planet has enough soil for only another 80 to 100 crops, which will last 60 years. We are removing organic content from the soil, 40% of the world's top soil is gone. We still have 15 to 25 years to turn things around; otherwise, we will soon be living in the desert. There will be civil war due to food shortages, and we have to pre-

Organiser and sponsor of the event in the Houses of Parliament, Rabindra Jung Lamichhane (Ravi) with Sadhguru

Sadhguru setting off for his journey

An outstanding inspection report for Bright Little Stars Sadhguru at Lord Basaveshwara's statue

vent this.”

The event at the Basaveshwara was organised by The Lambeth Basaveshwara Foundation, a non-profit organisation based in the UK that has installed the statue of Basaveshwara on the bank of river Thames.

Sadhguru applied sacred ash (Vibuthi) to the Basaveshwara statue and said it's a matter of great pride to see the statue of Lord Basaveshwara opposite the British Parliament.

Established in 2013, Bright Little Stars Nursery aims to provide a happy, healthy and safe learning environment for children in a caring and creative atmosphere. Having focussed on developing high quality standards of Early Years care and education for babies and young children through the implementation of the Early Years

Visit to the Parliament Square and High Commission of India London's Parliament Square was the flag off point for Sadhguru's 30,000-km motorbike tour on Monday. He said to the followers and key people, “For the next 100 days, the world must reverberate with one energy with one purpose to Save Soil. Talk soil, sing soil, breathe soil, live soil. Let’s make it happen. Be with me.” He touched Gandhiji’s (statue’s) feet in a symbolic gesture to seek his blessings and offered flowers before he started off his bike tour.

After a series of events scheduled in key cities along the way, he is aiming for a homecoming in New Delhi in 75 days in honour of

Foundation Stage, their unique BLS Learning Programme, holistic Parent Educational Programme, modern facilities, outdoor gardens and all-inclusive approach, they are able to support children to gain confidence in themselves and to achieve their full potential whilst nurturing their independence.

Bright Little Stars Nursery in Stanmore are overjoyed to have been awarded ‘Outstanding in all areas’ in their first Ofsted inspection accomplishing the highest possi-

in brief POTTERS BAR OSHWALS SIGN PETITION TO CHANGE MEETING DATE Oshwal Association of the UK, based in Potters Bar is urging its leaders to change the date of its upcoming special general meeting to a date other than Mother’s Day. Members are unhappy with the executive members of the group being inflexible as they want to spend time with their families.

Oshwals are largely followers of the Jain faith, an ancient religion originating from India which focuses on non-violence against other human beings. Many of the members posted on social media that they won't be able to attend the meeting as it falls on March 27 which is not only a Sunday but also a Mother’s Day. Group members have set up a change.org petition calling for a new date, with approaching 140 signatures of the 200 required

81 PER CENT BRITISH PUBLIC WANT REFUGEES TO WORK IN UK Campaigners are fighting for asylum seekers who are banned from working in the UK. Currently, they are only able to apply for the right to work after they have been waiting for a decision on their asylum claim for over a year. Refugees who are fleeing conflict and persecution to apply for asylum are left to exist on a government allowance of just £5.84 a day. Meanwhile, the large majority of the British public are in favour of providing employment opportunities to asylum seekers and will support the change in the rules. This week, MPs are expected to vote on the Nationality and Borders Bill that would allow many more asylum seekers the right to work six months after making a claim. According to the poll carried out last week by YouGov for the Lift The Ban coalition including Refugee Action found that 81 per cent of British adults support the change.

SUB-POSTMASTERS TO BE COMPENSATED BY NEW GOVERNMENT SCHEME The sub-postmasters who exposed the Post Office IT scandal but missed out on full compensation, due to huge legal fees will get paid under a new government scheme, the BBC has reported. The 555 workers had won a landmark civil case against the Post Office in 2019, but saw most of their settlements taken away in settling legal fees.Though the public inquiry into the scandal continues, they will now get the same level of compensation as other subpostmasters who were wrongly convicted by the government scheme. ble outcome. Since opening in October 2017, BLS Stanmore have worked continuously through reflective practice and an exceptional staff team, led by an inspirational manager Sarina Kukadia, to ensure the best possible outcomes for children. They are thrilled this hard work and dedication has been recognised by Ofsted, especially in such a short period of time since a new curriculum framework was introduced across the Early Years sector in September 2021 which was also accompanied by a revised Ofsted Education Inspection Framework.

As part of the inspection, children were observed, discussions were held with the management team, staff, children and parents around the quality of teaching and the impact this has on the children’s learning.

The nursery was graded outstanding in all areas which are broken down into the following key areas: the Quality of Education; Behaviour and Attitudes; Personal Development; and Leadership and Management.

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

05

06

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

IS BRITAIN INCLUSIVE? Continued from page 1

Kemi Badenoch MP, the Minister of State for Equality in her foreword said, “Of course, there is more to do to overcome barriers to opportunity, but that applies beyond ethnic minority groups, as the Commission found a huge proportion of white people from deprived backgrounds continue to be left behind by society… “‘Inclusive Britain’ sets out a raft of measures that translate the findings from the Commission’s report into concrete action. In doing so, we’ve considered and responded to each of the report’s 24 recommendations – in some cases going even further than the report envisaged. Inclusive Britain is a comprehensive plan that details 74 actions right across government, which together will put us on a course towards a more inclusive and integrated society.

“We do not agree with those who think that lack of opportunity should be seen solely through the prism of ethnic minority disadvantage. We do not believe that any group is less intrinsically capable than any other – ability is spread across the population. But opportunity is not.”

Organisations like Asian Voice has been trying to demonstrate and raise awareness about ‘Diversity, Equality and Inclusivity’ across Britain for the last 50 years.

Their upcoming panel discussion on 6 April in the House of Lords (see page 16-17) highlights the importance of change. But, if the Government does not openly acknowledge the existence of structural racism in our society, it cannot even begin to tackle the root causes, let alone implement the rules of equality.

Institutional racism a long battle The action plan talks about strengthening equalities, improving trust and fairness, tackling racial abuse- a step towards the right direction. But, when the Minister of Equality says lack of opportunity should not be seen through the prism of ethnic minority disadvantage- it very much ignores the actual attitudinal problem towards racism in Britain’s society. Whilst this country has definitely come a long way since 1960s and 70s, there is no denying, it still has a long way to go.

Healthcare professionals from the ethnic minority background who suffered from Covid-19, and died because of it, clearly faced adverse fate because of health disparity as well as lack of opportunity and differential treatment towards them. Even last week, the Homerton hospital had a notice asking everyone in the ward, as well as in the kitchen to speak in English only. It further said, “Disciplinary action will be taken against staff who do not comply.”

This does say something about Britain’s attitude towards immigrants.

Dr Chaand Nagpaul, BMA Chair of Council is hopeful that the report promises to investigate racial bias but is Dr Chaand disappointed at Nagpaul the downplaying of existing disparities. He said in a statement, “It is positive that the

report promises to investigate areas such as racial bias in medical equipment, reduced life expectancy and poorer maternal health, along with a pledge to hold healthcare providers to account for ethnic disparities in their workforce.

However, the report plays down some ethnic health disparities, quoting examples of improved health outcomes amongst certain racial groups with certain medical conditions, while ignoring the stark findings from the recent NHS Health and Race Observatory rapid review which revealed vast inequalities for those from ethnic minority communities across a range of health services including mental health.

“The Government has also failed to acknowledge or put forward an action plan to address the unequal adverse experience of ethnic minority healthcare workers in the NHS. There is indisputable evidence that doctors from ethnic minorities face additional hurdles, increased levels of bullying and harassment, poorer career progression, and excessive levels of disciplinary procedures, which we laid bare in our Racism in Medicine interim findings report.

In fact, systematic racism is often wrongly assumed to just be ‘part of the job’ for thousands of ethnic minority doctors and healthcare workers.

“The Government’s response to the CRED report comes in the same week that the BMA hosted a memorial service to commemorate those doctors who died from Covid-19, of which 85% were doctors from ethnic minority backgrounds – a statistic that defies random variation. This just serves to reinforce the reality of structural factors that placed certain doctors at increased risk from Covid. It is imperative that the NHS treats its workforce with the same values of equality that it espouses on patient care.

“If the Government will not openly acknowledge the existence of structural racism in society, it cannot begin to tackle the root causes that have led to unacceptable health disparities affecting certain ethnic groups. By refusing to listen to the lived experience of doctors and other healthcare workers from ethnic minority backgrounds, we will continue to see the unacceptable reality of certain groups of doctors suffering disadvantage.”

Dr Halima Begum, Chief Executive and Director of the Runnymede Trust, in her opinion piece in The Dr Halima Begum Guardian resonated similar thoughts. She said, “It would seem politically convenient to reduce the struggles of life down to these terms, allowing the government to distract from the need to improve conditions for communities in the UK. I certainly don’t know one member of the minority ethnic working class, including my parents, who would couch their experiences in this language. Our communities are made up of individuals of different ethnicities who all share overlapping commonalities that bind us, including – in addition to class – age, gender, faith and sexual orientation. These identities impact

every aspect of our lives in complex ways that move beyond a singular discussion of race. It is on this basis that for more than a decade the Runnymede Trust has been calling for all members of the working class to be offered protections under the Equality Act, regardless of their ethnicity, in acknowledgment of the vulnerabilities that exist across society.”

Lord Navnit Dholakia, deputy leader of the Lib Dem party in House of Lords, said, “Many workers have lost their lives and the pandemic showed how heavily we Lord Navnit Dholakia, depend on our diverse communities to serve our NHS. The actions set out by the government plan do not go nearly far enough to create a more inclusive society. They kick the can down the road on most issues with the creation of new strategies and frameworks in the years to come and are not dealt with enough immediacy and have a lack of inclusivity.

Echoing the concerns of many regarding the Criminal Justice System and the unequal affect its attitudes and practices have on ethnic minorities, Lord Dholakia pointed out, “The new framework for stop and search will not build trust between the police and the ethnic communities they serve, unless they end suspicion less stop and search due to its disproportionate impact on minorities.”

Showing his shock that some police and crime commissioners are not appointing additional police officers, he stated, “Underrepresentation of police in recruitment, retention and promotion still remains a concern after over 50 years.” Referring to the recent abhorrent intimate strip and search of a young black student, he stressed categorically that the lack of ethnic minority officers, “is not going to help the adversarial relations between the police and black communities.”

Dr Laia Bécares, Senior Lecturer in Applied Social Sciences at the University of Sussex, said: “There is a longstanding body of evidence documenting the existence of structural and institutional racism in the UK, how they underline individual acts of racism and discrimination, and how structural, institutional, and individual-level racism led to poor health and low socioeconomic position of ethnic minority people.

"The Sewell Report ignored this evidence and didn’t recognise the significance of racism to the lives of ethnic minority people in the UK. "Solutions and recommendations that arise from the Sewell Report, which don’t recognise the central role of racism, can’t lead to any meaningful solutions for these inequalities.”

A government that prides in its ethnic minority ministers in the Cabinet is surely on the right path of self-realisation. It is a success to see once in absolute denial, this government now is at least trying to find a solution to ‘level up’. It has made great strides towards achieving equality but only time will tell if these huge strategies really can be converted into actions.

An opportunity to close the gender and race finance gap

by Rupa Popat

T

he release of the government’s “Inclusive Britain” report last week was warmly welcomed by female entrepreneurs like myself, as it acknowledged that access to finance is still a major barrier for ethnic minority and female entrepreneurs. This is something I personally witnessed when I embarked on my journey as an entrepreneur in 2012.

The report launched by Minister for Equalities, Kemi Badenoch MP, has been put together after working with key stakeholders, including lenders to better understand the underlying causes and to agree interventions to improve access to finance.

That’s why initiatives like the UKwide Start Up Loans programme, the free mentorship provided, the Future Fund and the BEIS-supported HSBC Entrepreneur Support programme are so important to support bridging this gap.

According to research by Salonica Maroon, ethnic minority entrepreneurs are over a third more likely to have given up on their businesses due to a lack of funding compared to their white peers.

This comes at a time when it’s proven that diversity creates superior returns and female entrepreneurs have been outperforming their male counterparts.

Despite these encouraging headlines, there continues to be a widening gap in funding access for ethnic minority and female entrepreneurs.

The Alison Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship found that, given a level playing field, women business owners could add £250 billion to the economy in a decade and BCG reported that female-founded companies are more likely to have an exit and a higher return for investors. This just further highlights that backing female entrepreneurs is good business.

However, according to research firm Pitchbook, all female-founding teams secured only 2% of venture capital in 2021, despite owning 38% of businesses and a joint study produced by Cornerstone Partners, Engage Inclusivity, Diversity VC and Beauhurst founded that Asian and Black businesses in the U.K. made up just 7.3% and 2.9% of the total raised in 2019.

The same study also found that three-quarters of entrepreneurs came from advantaged socioeconomic backgrounds and a majority graduated from prestigious universities, with hardly any came from families living on welfare entitlements.

So, when women and ethnic minority entrepreneurs are outperforming and can add so much to the economy, what can be done to fix this imbalance and bridge the funding gap?

I believe that representation is key and with 76% of the venture capitalist firms in the UK being surveyed as white, 70% as men and 33% as having a degree from either Oxford, Cambridge,

Harvard, or Stanford, introducing diversity is essential. Especially when female venture capitalists have been proven to be two times more likely to invest in female founders than their male counterparts.

Whilst one way is to increase diversity in existing funds, it was recently highlighted at a panel that I was moderating for Ada Ventures, that a key opportunity for driving tangible change in the eco-system, comes from increasing the number of emerging funds launched and run by women and ethnic minority founders. Several such funds have launched in the UK in recent years with female founding partners including Ada Ventures, Zinc Ventures and EKA Ventures, where the British Business Bank has been their largest investor through the Enterprise Capital Funds programme.

The “Investing in Women Code” has been signed by 134 lenders and investors including many high street banks and over 90 venture capital firms. The BEIS is working with these lenders in 2022 to collect relevant data on the finance gap and identify follow-up actions. I welcome such initiatives from the Government to work with stakeholders to drive change.

As the report suggests, like many of the other biases faced by ethnic minorities and women in our society, we need to start tackling the problem as early as possible, in family homes, schools and universities. I was extremely fortunate to grow up in a family where I was exposed to entrepreneurship from an early age and am certain this is what propelled me to explore entrepreneurship after a career in investment banking.

That’s also why initiatives like HSBC’s Entrepreneur Support programme, supported by BEIS, for under-represented university students are important. The programme will equip aspiring ethnic minority and female entrepreneurs with the skills they need across numerous topics including finance, investment, advisory and publicity.

Whether it comes in the form of skill-based teaching programmes or mentorship, initiatives such as these are key to reach ethnic minority and female students at an earlier age, before they embark on their entrepreneurial journeys and hopefully encourage more down this path.

Whilst there has been great progress in the last decade, the government’s report provides a unique opportunity to drive even more change in the decade ahead.

As MP Kemi Badenoch said; “Anyone in this country should be able to achieve anything, no matter where they live or come from.”

Rupa Popat is a serial entrepreneur, board advisor and angel investor in under-represented entrepreneurs and femalefounded venture capital funds. https://www.linkedin.com/in/r upapopat/?originalSubdomain=uk

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

07

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

PRODUCED IN ASSOCIATION WITH THE NHS

‘TIME IS MUSCLE’

The early signs of a heart attack sometimes may not feel severe, but it’s never too early to call 999

A heart attack is caused by sudden blockage of the blood supply to the heart leading to symptoms like chest pain and breathlessness.

It can be easy to dismiss the early signs of a heart attack. It could be just a feeling of overwhelming uneasiness, pressure, tightness or squeezing across the chest.

Rupanjana Dutta Dr Amardeep Dastidar, Consultant Interventional Cardiologist at North Bristol NHS Trust & Bristol Heart Institute told Asian Voice, “The early signs of heart attack may be chest pain or sensation of a tight band in the chest often going to the arm and jaw. Sometimes a sudden onset of breathlessness may also be an early sign of heart attack especially in people with diabetes.

“The affected person is usually sweaty, nauseous and pale. For some it may be just vague discomfort in the chest or upper part of tummy or like bad indigestion.”

The risk of having a heart attack is increased by smoking, a high fat diet, diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and being overweight or obese.

Dr Dastidar said, “This risk can be reduced by stopping smoking and controlling your blood pressure, diabetes and cholesterol. A healthy diet with more fruits, vegetables, lentils and fewer fatty foods, and less salt is also important.”

The British Heart Foundation quotes that first generation South Asians are at a 50% higher risk compared to white European population in the UK. There are many reasons for this increased risk. These include dietary habits, South Asians are genetically more susceptible, have

more abdominal obesity, and have more common early onset of type 2 diabetes.

It can be easy to dismiss the

early signs of a heart attack but it’s never too early to call 999 and describe your symptoms.

Concerns have been raised about women delaying care.

Despite heart attacks more frequently affecting men, 35,000 women are admitted to hospital following a heart attack each year in the UK - an average of 98 women per day, or 4 per hour.

Whilst men are more likely to recognise the symptoms of a heart attack, women may dismiss symptoms. Women’s risk of a heart attack increases after menopause, so it’s important to take these symptoms seriously.

“We need to take care of ourselves more” Immigration lawyer Harjap Singh Bhangal, had a jacket potato for lunch and in a short while started to feel uneasy, as if there was something heavy sitting on his chest. So, he returned home to London and told his mum that he felt he had gas and indigestion and the food was stuck in his chest, “Her response was like all Indian mums, suggesting I have some tea,” Harjap told Asian Voice.

“The next day I thought to myself, I know why this is happening. I haven’t been to the gym for a while. So I went to the gym, I did a 5K run, followed by sauna and steam. But in the evening the feeling of uneasiness was still there.”

The following day Harjap

had to do the school run, and still felt uncomfortable. So, his mum suggested him that he go to the hospital. “So, I dropped my daughter off to school, and instead of going shopping in Hounslow that day, I drove into the hospital. They did my ECG, and it was fine, but because I had complained of chest discomfort, they said they had to do my blood tests. After they did my blood and results came in, three-four doctors huddled together, and I heard them mention Troponin. I immediately googled and saw that Troponin isn’t normally found in the blood. It’s an enzyme released into the bloodstream when heart muscles become damaged.”

A doctor immediately called him over and told him that

something was wrong with his heart, and they were taking him to the emergency theatre. He was asked to call his family and inform them. “When I tried to explain

Dr Dastidar added, “It is well recognised that women more commonly present with symptoms of heart attack like jaw and back pain, shortness of breath, nausea and vomiting.

“Heart attack if not treated early can lead to heart muscle damage leading to heart failure i.e. the heart is unable to pump efficiently. The scarring from the heart attack can lead to heart rhythm abnormality in the future.

If treated early by coronary angioplasty or bypass surgery (before heart muscle damage), people can have a normal or near normal life.

“Heart attack survivors need to be on medications and should try and reduce their risk factors. This will also help in preventing future heart attacks.

“Calling 999 is the most important measure to prevent damage from heart attack, thereby preventing death or future complications.

“It definitely saves lives, and earlier the call, the better. As an interventional cardiologist we always use the phrase ‘Time is muscle’ – the quicker we treat artery blockage the less the muscle damage. Any delay in recognition of heart attack causes more muscle damage.”

It’s never too early to call 999 and describe your symptoms. For more information visit: nhs.uk/ heartattack. that I needed to pick up my daughter and go home, the doctor told me that I was having a heart attack. In fact, I had been having one for two days. They added that I was very lucky that I came in early. If I hadn’t, I would have collapsed on the street within 12 hours. I wasn’t comprehending what was happening. I phoned my dad, my dad rushed to the hospital. I had to WhatsApp my mum and we both started crying.

The doctors soon wheeled me into the theatre. They stented me. I had a double bypass, and I was only 44 at that time. I was in pretty good health, went to gym regularly. I had silent symptoms and nothing dramatic.”

Post-surgery, he was in the hospital for 10-12 days and in his ward were many 60–70-yearold patients, who asked, “What

Symptoms of a heart attack can include

• Chest pain – a feeling of pressure, heaviness, tightness or squeezing across your chest • Pain in other parts of the body – it can feel as if the pain is spreading from your chest to your arms (usually the left arm, but it can affect both arms), jaw, neck, back and tummy • Feeling lightheaded or dizzy • Sweating • Shortness of breath • Feeling sick (nausea) or being sick (vomiting) • An overwhelming feeling of anxiety or unease (like a panic attack) • Coughing or wheezing Call 999 immediately if you think someone might be having a heart attack. The faster you act, the better their chances. are you doing here? You are so young”- which made Harjap think.

“I realised it was years of abuse on my body till I was about 30- eating out on most of the days, oily food, not looking after myself that took a toll on me! And, I have been trying to raise awareness ever since I recovered. I made an awareness video from my hospital bed, which had millions of views.

I explained in the video what happened to me and to make sure that it does not happen to you.

We need to change our diet which is full of sugar, carb and oil. We always think of work. We need to destress, holiday more, take breaks more. There is lack of walking or exercise. Things that were natural for our ancestors, like walking for hours- we barely do that. We need to go back to that sort of roots.”

08

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Panellists urge women to keep going with purpose and motivation

by Rupanjana Dutta

T

he second annual Women in Conversation networking event and panel discussion was hosted by Asian Voice and Gujarat Samachar on Friday 18 March 2022 in association with the Royal Air Force.

The theme for the panel discussion was ‘charting the unknown and breaking stereotypes’.

Held at the Courthouse Hotel Shoreditch in London, the moderator for the panel discussion was award-winning public relations and media professional Sangeeta Waldron and the panellists were singer and songwriter Rumer, bespoke jewellery designer Sam Ubhi and speaker, author and leadership coach Sahera Chohan.

In her address to the audience Group Captain Joanne Swainston of the Royal Air Force spoke about the RAF’s approach towards diversity and inclusion, and the opportunities available to women within the organisation. She said, “Air Chief Marshal Sir Mike Wigston is a passionate advocate for diversity, and the RAF recognises the energy, value and effectiveness that a diverse and fully inclusive workforce brings to any organisation.

We encourage all our personnel to be passionate advocates of diversity.

“Our collective

network and emotional manipulation.

Demanding radical changes in the music industry and talking about her journey, Rumer said that her large Pakistani family were very musical. She admitted that it took a lot of hard work, dedication, and sacrifice to secure a record and described how she took up odd jobs to make ends meet but dedicated one day a week for three years to record her debut album.

“I never actually realised how bad it

responsibility is to make sure that everyone can feel valued and included for who they are, what they bring to our organisation, and what they do to enhance the operational capability of the Royal Air Force.

And a positive attitude to diversity and inclusion must be part of our normal business, a fundamental part of everything we do, and every action or decision that we take.

“All roles in the Royal Air Force are open to women. It is a place

where women can achieve their full potential and have meaningful and fulfilling careers. We are seeing an increasing number of women in senior leadership roles.

“I believe mentoring and supporting one another is exceedingly important. And events such as the Women in Conversation where we share our experience, wisdom and ways to support one another is very important.”

Panellists challenge stereotyping The moderator of the panel, Sangeeta Waldron, in her unique and lucid conversational style walked the audience through the fascinating life stories of panellists Rumer, Sam Ubhi and Sahera Chohan. All three speakers were honest and forthright about the myriad issues they had faced, the barriers to their success, and their self-doubts. The challenges that they faced included a lack of support from both men and women, ageism, patriarchy, lack of a support

RAF personnel with panelists Bottom row L-R: Rumer, Sangeeta Waldron, CB Patel-Chairman ABPL Group, Gp Capt Joanne Swainston, Sam Ubhi and Sahera Chohan

was until I got into the music business,” she said. “I didn't realise there was a system of patriarchy. I wasn't really exposed to it too much. And then when I got into the music business, I realised how dominant it was, and how the whole system was designed for men. It was incredibly difficult because you as a woman are always assumed to be emotional.”

Sam opined that you need to have originality and drive to succeed. She said that being a woman designer she has been often stereo-typed or racially profiled. She said, “Within the Asian community, you don't really see many female jewellers. So, you are a minority. Most of the traders, gold traders, stone traders are also all men.”

Sahera, who grew up in a white dominated locality discovered her Indian roots much later in life. In her quest for a job as a media presenter, she was first offered the job of a chauffeur for celebrities in the BBC. She went on to describe how she eventually landed a job as a presenter and the story of her “accidental” investigative work that won her several accolades. Emphasising why fighting self-doubt is key, she said, “You can't necessarily control what's happening outside. But you can certainly control what's happening within yourself and your attitude towards it. If I can't get through one door, I'll try another. And so, I just keep going with purpose and motivation.”

The afternoon concluded with a short comment by CB Patel, Editor-in-Chief, Asian Voice and Gujarat Samachar, followed by an evening reception with drinks and canapés.

Photo credit: Raj D Bakrania, Pr Media Pix

AsianVoiceNews

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

FIND Y YOUR OUR ROLE TECHNICAL AND ENGINEERING Engineering Officer (Communications Electronics) Engineering Officer (Aerosystems) Aircraft Technician Technician (Avionics) v Aircraft Technician Technician (Mechanical) Electrician Survival Equipment Specialist Vehicle & Mech Equipment TTechnician echnician General Technician Workshop Weapon Technician Comms Infra Technician Cyberspace Communication Specialist Photographer

FORCE PROTECTION RAF Regiment Officer RAF Police Officer RAF Regiment Gunner RAF Police

COMMUNIC ATIONS AND INTELLIGENCE Intelligence Officer Intelligence Analyst (Linguist) Intelligence Analyst Joint Cyber Unit

MEDICAL AND MEDICAL SUPPORT Dental Officer Medical Officer (Doctor) Medical Support Officer (Physio) Medical Support Officer Nursing Officer Registered Nurse (Mental Health) Registered Nurse (Adult) Student Nurse (Adult) Environmental Health Technician Biomedical Scientist Pharmacy Technician Dental Nurse Radiographer Operating Dept Practitioner RAF Medic

PERSONNEL SUPPORT Personnel Support Officer Personnel Training Officer Legal Officer Chaplain Musician Physical Training Instructor Personnel Support Media Operations*

LOGISTICS Logistics Officer Chef Air & Ground Steward Driver RAF Supplier Mover

AIRCREW Pilot Weapons Systems Operator Weapons Systems Operator (Linguist) Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) Pilot

AIR OPERAATIONS TIONS SUPPORT Air Cartographer Air Operations (Control) Officer Air Operations (Systems) Officer Air Operations (Control) Sergeant Air & Space Operations Specialist (Flight Operations) Air & Space Operations Specialist (Aerospace Systems) Firefighter Flight Operations Manager*

*only available as an RAF Reserve Role

Search RAF R Recruitment

0345 60 05 5555 /rafrecruitment

@RAF AF_Recr Recruitment

Excellent starting saalary and career progression sion Guaranteed job after successful training ning Gain civilian-recognised qualifications

09

10

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

India’s GDP growth It is really a matter of great pride for every Indian that India’s GDP growth is expected at 7.8% according to Crisil (AV 19-25 March 2022). Despite various odds faced by the country in terms of Covid and its effect, this is a very impressive growth rate. It is a proof that India’s growth is on its fundamental strengths and not entirely dependent on outside countries.

On the same note, it is worth mentioning that India’s foreign exchange reserve is 5th highest in the world.

Economic indices are the most important measurement of the strength of any country. International businesses watch them closely and take investment decisions based on these facts. Giving freebies will keep some section of society happy for time being to win elections but weaken the fabric of society in long run.

The recent election win of BJP in 4 out of 5 state assemblies is a sequel of solid growth-based strategies keeping in mind the overall growth of the region without compromising on the national agenda.

The youth of India is interested in progressive, forward-looking global power with plenty of opportunities for growth and development. They are not interested in free meals or temporary relief. They want to use their talent in the development of the country. The present government in the center is capable of helping the youth in fulfilling their dreams.

Hitesh Hingu London

Need for a nationwide scrappage scheme I am joining the chorus of calls for the Government to roll out a nationwide scrappage scheme to help those that need to switch to greener vehicles. This will help to clean the air across London and indeed the whole of the UK. It will also help the manufacturing industry and boost jobs in the UK. Bold action is needed to tackle London’s triple threat of toxic air, the climate emergency and congestion. This is why the Mayor is proposing to expand the Ultra-Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) to cover the whole of Greater London next year.

ULEZ not only protects Londoners now, but also future generations to come, tackling head-on some of the deep-rooted health problems and inequalities our city faces. Four out of five Londoners don’t need to worry about ULEZ charges as their vehicles are already compliant with stricter emissions standards.

In London, toxic air contributes to thousands of premature deaths each year.

The capital’s poor air quality hits poorest communities hardest. Nearly half of Londoners don’t own a car, but they are breathing in the harmful emissions of the most polluting cars.

Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic Londoners are also more likely to be affected by the impact of the climate crisis, new City Hall analysis shows.

More than half a million Londoners have asthma – including roughly 240,000 children. Air pollution was responsible for triggering asthma attacks in two-thirds of sufferers, according to Asthma UK and the British Lung Foundation. Getting more polluting vehicles off our streets will help improve the health outcomes of those living in London. Policy needs to match the ambitions that we have to clean up our air.

Cllr Krupesh Hirani AM London Assembly Member for Brent and Harrow

A blessing called mother Mother’s Day, or Mothering Sunday in the U.K and Ireland, is a day to show love, gratitude, and appreciation to all wonderful mums everywhere, through act of kindness and giving of gifts and flowers. Mother’s Day celebrations dates back as far as the ancient Greeks where they would celebrate Rhea, the mother of Gods and Goddesses, every spring. The Romans also celebrated a Mother Goddess, Cybele, every March since 250BC. In Hindu religion Goddess Laxmi, Parvati and Saraswati are also worshipped and prayers are offered by total devotion for heathy, happy, and peaceful life with family.

We extend our warmest wishes on Mother’s Day to all mothers living or no more in this world for their unconditional love, care, dedication, and sacrifice.

Mother’s Day celebration should not be limited to one day but also celebrated everyday by spending quality time with mums. My wife’s mother Shardaben Patel due to her health issues was in Indian Nursing home South Plain field, New Jersey 4 years ago and her son Prafulbhai Patel and his wife Truptiben Patel visited her from Baltimore and they video called us. We all had good chat with her, and she was so happy. But next day she passed away. That was most memorable time we all had to cherish forever.

Suresh and Bhavna Patel Markham, Canada

British People’s generosity knows no bounds The announcement by Home Office that every household who takes in Ukrainian refugee fleeing the war, Russian aggression, will receive £350 per month. It seems the allowance will be the same, whether it is one person or a family. So far nearly 150k people have registered their interest and figure is going up hour by hour and that includes some well-known personalities, as well as generous hearted OAPs. It will take some time for the government to vet all these people, as there is no shortage of crooks, thugs and criminals who would exploit the situation and pocket millions, as it happened in tower bloc fire tragedy. These crooks have no shame, no ethics, no pride and certainly no morals. Then our legal system with bleeding-heart judges and politicians, corruption in police, weak sentencing and cultural vacuum is mainly responsible for the sharp rise in so called soft crimes that costs the government billions, depriving NHS and Social Services much needed funds!

Looking after, accommodating people, most of whom may not speak English and these are mainly women, children and elderly people, as the young and able Ukrainians stay behind to fight Russian aggression. Although West sees this as a short-term problem, expecting most to return home once war is over, this is a misconception, as towns and cities are turned into rubbles and debris not fit for human occupation.

This is similar situation as in Syria. All these buildings will have to be demolished and rebuild towns, cities and infrastructure that will take time and money. The populist West has bulldozed Ukraine into this conflict for pretentious political reasons, using phraseology not seen since downfall of Hitler! Let’s see how generous West is when it comes to lending helping hand to these people who were hoodwinked into war they could not win, could not afford. This is West’s war, NATO war fought by a proxy, Ukraine scarified at the altar of Western hypocrisy.

Bhupendra M. Gandhi

Does the West care a hoot about the poor?

If one looks at the past events of the last five centuries one find that it is the western European countries and their clones who have brought misery to the rest of the world.

They have colonised, plundered and butchered natives all over the world, eliminated several cultures and populated clones in foreign lands in their own image like, Canada, USA, Australia and New Zealand.

After the World War II they created the United Nations to bring harmony, peace and equality for the whole humanity. However, they kept instruments of controls and implementations of those noble aims in their own hands. For an example, the four of the five permanent seats with veto powers in the UNSC are assigned to France, Russia, UK and USA with a total population of 600 million while Bharat with a population of 1400 million has no permanent seat and no say. Can one find a single UN body of importance headquartered in Africa or Asia? On the other hand they have disregarded the UN and carried out war destruction on several nations in the world.

Without going into the rights and wrongs of the war in Ukraine, let us look at the consequences of their imposed sanctions on Russia. Did they think about the impact of their action on the poor nations of the world?

The oil price which was hovering around 60 dollars a barrel, jumped to above 100 dollars on their action. Canada and USA are among the highest producers of oil and the rest of the bunch amongst them are rich enough to avoid economic impact due to higher oil prices. The poor nations of the world will suffer the most in monetary hardship and economic stagnation due to the actions of the West. Does the West care a hoot about the poor?

Narsibhai Patel New Malden

Odd request Russia is one of world superpowers so why it is asking another superpower, China, to give military help for attacking small country like Ukraine? I cannot understand reason for this strange request. Readers of Asian Voice newspaper may be puzzled like myself on this point.

Ash Gupta

All gone A philosopher was once asked what weapons he thought would be used in a Third World War. He replied: " I don't know but the war following that will be fought with sticks and stones." In my humble opinion the philosopher was wrong. After what is certain to be a full-scale nuclear war there will be nobody left to fight with sticks and stones.

Rudy Otter

•

Kapil Dudakia

Kapil’s KHICHADI

Freedom for Muslim Women Indian Court Ruling The Indian High Court made a history making ruling on whether Muslim girls had the right to wear a Hijab against the declared policy of an educational institution on school uniform.

The judgement was both clear and far reaching. The judges ruled that the hijab was not an "essential religious practice in Islamic faith" and dismissed a set of petitions filed by Muslim students. The verdict confirms what many Islamic scholars have stated that there is no requirement in Islam for women to wear such garments.

In fact, the Hijab in all its variations is more to do with the cultural practice of some communities in the Middle East.

The verdict comes as a damning blow to the extremists in India who have used religion to sow discord.

Interestingly, the vast majority of these Muslim students have been in education for years without the Hijab. In fact, clear evidence has emerged that some of the girls leading the Hijab charge have displayed themselves openly on social media sites like Facebook and Instagram. Many of them have multiple selfies showing their latest hairstyles, make up tips and posing like western Hollywood stars to attract attention.

And these same girls suddenly woke up one day to and realised they had to wear the Hijab! The tragedy of this morally and ethically bankrupt action by these girls means they have themselves destroyed their own futures. They have accepted to be slaves to some Muslim men who command and demand that their women behave in a certain way. They have gone on their knees to the demands of the Mullahs who have always abused their position of power to act against women and keep them enslave.

The Indian left media (and their loudspeaker international colleagues) jumped on the bandwagon, as did some politicians whose only interest was to garner the Muslim vote.

The matter went to the courts of course, and in the 129-page judgement, the judges made it very clear, the wearing of the Hijab is NOT an essential element of Islam.

For context, lest the western wokes attempt to spread their misinformation, the following European states have introduced full or partial ban of the burqa: Austria, France, Belgium, Denmark, Bulgaria, the Netherlands (in public schools, hospitals and on public transport), Germany (partial bans in some states), Italy (in some localities), Spain (in some localities of Catalonia) and the list goes on. In fact, even the European Court itself has ruled that such bans are legal.

The madness of the Hijab knows no bounds. Did you know that there is something called, ‘World Hijab Day’!

Yes, you cannot make this up if you tried. The international community have come together to enslave Muslim women and then celebrate that slavery.

Fortunately, there are others fighting this madness. In response to World Hijab Day, Yasmine Mohammed, a Canadian human-rights campaigner started the #NoHijabDay campaign in 2018 to “…celebrate the women who have defied social censure and the state to remove the hijab”.

The Indian courts in their judgement (like the Triple Talak Laws) has empowered Muslim women by giving them legal backing not to wear the oppressive sign of slavery to men. In one simple ruling, it has freed millions of Muslim women.

The chains of a culture and a community to silence its women should not be seen as a choice made by women. They wear the Hijab because after hundreds of years of brainwashing, their men have made them into possessions.

In the words of Yasmine Mohammed: “It is sad to see that there remains this pervasive idea that Muslims all share a culture. No. They do not. They each have distinct cultures that have just been shrouded by Islam in the same way each individual girl's personality gets shrouded by hijab so that they all start looking the same.”

We are grateful to all letter writers for more and more versatile letters well within word limit. Please keep contributing as always. If you are new, then write to Shefali at shefali.saxena@abplgroup.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

11

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

British Summer Time begins

On Sunday 27 March 2022, in the UK, the clocks will go forward 1 hour at 1am.

Don’t forget to change the time on your clocks and watches!

MOTHER’S DAY MESSAGES

We salute our mum Bhavna for all that she does for us, daily. She is our role model and we love her so much. Giving her hugs and a bouquet of flowers on Mother’s Day.

Warm wishes from Dylan and Priyen Katwa, Birmingham.

To the most amazing mummy in the entire universe... you! Happy Mother's Day. Thanks for being so awesome!

Lots of love, hugs and kisses from Niam.

Happy Mother's Day to the greatest mum! We don't say it enough, but we really appreciate all that you do for us every day.

Lots of love from Sachin, Manjri, Bijal & Neil.

BoJo speaks to NaMo on Ukraine Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke on Tuesday afternoon.

al law was the only way to ensure global peace and prosperity.

Prime Minister Modi updated on India’s support

The leaders discussed the grave situation in Ukraine, and the Prime Minister said he believed the actions of Vladimir Putin’s regime were deeply disturbing and disastrous for the world.

The pair agreed that Ukraine’s integrity and territorial sovereignty must be respected.

Russia needed to adhere to the UN Charter, the leaders said, and both agreed that respect for internation-

for the humanitarian situation in Ukraine, and the Prime Minister Johnson said the UK and India should intensify efforts to promote peace and de-escalation in the region.

The leaders welcomed India and the UK’s strong and prosperous relationship, and agreed to continue to build on trade, security and business ties in the coming weeks and months.

They looked forward to meeting in person at the earliest opportunity.

Give extra help to mothers fleeing war in Ukraine, Lord Loomba urges Government The plight of Ukrainian mothers fleeing with their children reminds us that women’s equality is not a matter of ticking boxes, Lord Loomba said in this year’s International Women’s Day debate which took place in the House of Lords yesterday (17 March).

“Equality,” he said, “requires us to take the trouble to see the reality of how others live. To see it and respond with the humanity and generosity that we are so quick to claim but so slow to dispense.”

These mothers face a “double whammy”, Lord Loomba said. “The inequality of the refugee, navigating the many obstacles placed in their way as they seek refuge, as we have seen in recent weeks, and the inequality of the single mother, who must not only be there for her children, but also put food on the table, clothe them, ensure they can go to school and receive medical care.”

The Loomba Foundation, he revealed “is planning an association with Rotary International worldwide, and with Rotary International in Britain & Ireland, to raise funds in support of Ukrainian mothers fleeing with their dependent children. We will draw on the Loomba Foundation’s extensive experience of the plight of widows – including those widowed in conflict and natural disasters – who all too often face that same double whammy of a sudden change in their status with an increased responsibility for their dependents.

The mothers and children fleeing from Ukraine are in that situation and we know what it takes to give them

Lord Loomba speaking in the International Women's Day debate in Grand Committee in the House of Lords, 17 March 2022 Picture courtesy: Parliamentlive.tv

the support they need.”

Lord Loomba appealed to the Government to connect the dots across national and local government to offer tailored and joined-up support for these refugees by “identifying the likely needs from counselling and health to schooling and economic empowerment, and to facilitate a multi-agency response, reaching out to mothers arriving with their children and telling them about the special support that’s available, and setting up a special helpline they can contact for advice.”

“Women’s inequality has

all too often been invisible and ignored,” Lord Loomba said, “yet the irony is that it is women who are the first emergency service, the people we rely on to look after the children and to care for the elderly and vulnerable.

“Making women’s equality real means understanding and dealing with the barriers they face,” he concluded. “That is an investment that always pays off.”

Replying for the Government, Women’s Minister Baroness StedmanScott assured the House that the Government is “absolutely committed to

supporting Ukrainian women and girls, recognising the critical contribution that women are making on the front line and in communities affected by the conflict”, and she noted the vital work of civil society organisations in dealing with the impact of the conflict on women and girls as “they will be more exposed to the risk of violence, particularly sexual and genderbased violence”.

The Minister praised Lord Loomba’s planned partnership with Rotary worldwide and in the UK to help Ukrainian mothers and asked him to express her gratitude for their efforts.

She noted that if Ukrainian women and children are not helped to integrate into our communities, “sex traffickers will get hold of them.

They will be forced into prostitution, there will be forced adoptions—the list goes on”.

The Minister revealed that she had given her word to Ukraine’s ambassador to the UN that such help would be given.

Ribbon cutting ceremony held at Navnat Centre A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held at the Navnat Centre in Hayes on Sunday, 13 March to mark the inauguration of the new dining hall extension.

Speaking at the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, Dilipbhai Mithani, President of Navnat Vanik Association UK, said, Navnat Centre is a home of our vibrant community. The Mayor Cllr Hillingdon Roy

Chamdal, ex-Mayor Cllr Harrow Nitin Parekh, ex-Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, John McDonnell, MP, Lord Dolar Popat, main donors from the Navnat community, including Rohitkumar B Mehta, Koolesh Shah, Ketan Adani, Yogesh B Mehta and Editor-in-Chief of Asian Voice-Gujarat Samachar C B Patel were also present. The ribbon cutting ceremony was beautifully decorated by Hall Secretary Hasmitaben Doshi and coordinated by Mamta Tolia.

12

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

SCRUTATOR’S Chennai boy solves Rubik's Cube while riding bicycle Solving the Rubik's Cube is not a cakewalk. Many people who have attempted to solve it have either lost patience or interest after repeated failures. But a boy from Chennai solved the puzzle with unbelievable speed. Not just that - he solved a Rubik's cube in mere seconds while riding a bicycle, a feat that has earned him a Guinness World Record.

Guiness World Records shared a video of Jayadharshan Venkatesan on Instagram, saying he solved a Rubik's cube in just 14.32 seconds. The video showed Jayadharshan riding a bicycle and solving the Rubik's Cube with both hands. He raised his hand the moment he finished the challenge. “Speedcubing on a bicycle - 14.32 seconds by Jayadharshan Venkatesan (from India),” said Guinness World Records in the caption. The record keeper added, in a comment, that Jayadharshan was working on his speed solving skills for two years until he was confident that he would be able to achieve this title. The social media upload has garnered 262,000 views and several comments congratulating the boy. “Now, that's a record,” a user wrote. Pointing at the boy's expression, another said, “The lad isn't even smiling, he means business”. Two years ago, another person from Chennai had tried to enter the records book by solving the most number of Rubik's cube underwater. Illayaram Sekar entered the Guinness World Records by solving six cubes in one breadth. He spent 2 minutes and 17 seconds underwater and beat the previous record of five Rubik's cubes solved under water. (Agency) Man with prosthetic leg running food stall wins hearts This is the story of a man with a prosthetic leg and the challenges he faced to earn a living through his hard work. A video shows how he runs a food stall in Delhi with a prosthetic leg. The video will definitely inspire people to work hard. The video has so far received 127,000 views. In the video, the vendor is seen walking with a limp as he shows his prosthetic leg. He sells a veg thali for only ₹50. He is seen putting food in the thali and making chapattis. The thali contains kadhi, rajmah, rice and chapattis.“Inko Help Nahi Chahie Bass Jakar Try Karo Inka Khana (He doesn’t need help, just go and try his food),” says the caption of the video. The comments section of the post was filled with appreciative comments as people praised the spirit of the man. (Agency) Delhi Metro employee creates a record Prafull Singh, an employee of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC), has travelled to 254 stations covering 348 km to create a world record. The DMRC took to Twitter to share about this achievement. “DMRC employee Prafull Singh has entered into the Guinness World Records (GWR) for recording the 'Fastest time to travel to all Metro stations'. This makes him the first person to travel to 254 stations covering 348 km in just 16 hours and 2 minutes.

DMRC family is proud of Prafull's feat,” they wrote. “Congratulations,” wrote a Twitter user. “Wow, what a unique record,” shared another. “Waoo congratulations,” posted a third. (Agency) 'Wife's not female'; man moves SC for divorce

A woman has been asked by the

Supreme Court to respond to her husband's plea seeking divorce on the grounds that she is "not a female." The SC asked the woman to file a reply to her husband's petition challenging a Madhya Pradesh High Court order of July 29, last year. The medical history of the woman shows "penis + imperforate hymen", so she is not a female, the Supreme Court said.

The High Court had earlier dismissed the man's petition saying "only on the basis of oral evidence and without medical evidence", a cheating charge could not be established. The man's petition says the couple married in 2016 but his wife "did not consummate their marriage for some days claiming she was menstruating". She left and returned after six days. The petition says when the man tried to get intimate with his wife, he found "no presence of a vaginal opening and found she had a small penis". The petitioner took his wife for a medical check-up and the diagnosis was that she has a medical problem called "imperforate hymen".

Imperforate hymen is a condition in which the hymen covers the opening of the vagina. The man says his wife was advised to get her condition surgically repaired but the doctor said the chances of pregnancy were close to impossible. The petitioner said he felt cheated and called his fatherin-law, asking him to take his daughter back. The woman had a surgery and then returned to her husband after her father allegedly threatened him. The man later filed a complaint with the police and approached the court seeking a divorce.

(Agency) Girl with impaired leg now a kickboxer As a kid, she was teased by some of her friends as she had a limp in her leg caused by a road accident when she was just three years old. But now no one dares to mess with Dinkal Gorkha, fondly called ‘Dinku Boxer’. This 16-year-old girl, who has an impaired left leg, is now a kick-boxing champion. And the teenager is eyeing to make it big in the sport of boxing. “When kids of my age mocked me for the limp, I used to feel embarrassed. I wanted to prove that I am as physically able as others. I got the much-needed inspiration at the age of nine when I saw the movie 'Mary Kom.' I

was motivated by her struggle as well as boxing as a sport,” Dinkal tsaid. She joined boxing classes about four years ago. “I started with kick boxing despite many advising me against it due to my impaired left leg. But I was determined to prove them all wrong. For a few months, I endured lot of pain as the leg took a lot of pressure and I used to pop pain killers,” Dinkal recalled. “But gradually, I learnt how to handle the pain and use the left leg lethally while boxing. I have got a yellow belt in kickboxing and now I am preparing myself for Khel Mahakumbh to compete at state-level under my coach Siddharth Bhalegare,” she added. (The Times of India)

Gita. In another significant decision, the government has also decided to introduce English as a compulsory subject from class 1. The decisions will be applicable to the schools affiliated to the Gujarat Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Board.

“People from all faiths have accepted the moral values and principles outlined in the ancient Hindu scripture,” Vaghani said.

“The decision is in line with the National Education Policy unveiled by the Centre.

This is being done so that students can feel proud of India’s rich culture,” he added.

Vaghani said the Gita will be introduced in the ‘Sarvangi Shikshan’ (holistic education) textbook in Classes 6 to 8. (The Times of India)

India's first ‘steel slag road’ laid in Surat

What this IPS officer carried in his bag

India's first ‘steel slag road’ has come up in Surat, promising a huge potential to reduce the demand for aggregates in road construction. The successful implementation of the 1.2 km six-lane connectivity stretch of the Hazira Port will also pave the way for utilisation of huge mounds of steel slag lying as waste across the country. Aggregates are inert granular materials such as sand, gravel and crushed stone used in road construction. This research project under the steel ministry was sponsored by ArcelorMittal Nippon Steel under the technical guidance of the Central Road Research Institute. This stretch has been built by substituting natural aggregates with 100% processed steel slag aggregates. Considering its higher strength, the thickness of the road has also been reduced by 30%. Tata Steel, JSW Steel and Rashtriya Ispat are participating as industrial partners to accomplish the steel slag utilisation in road construction. Around 100,000 tonnes of processed steel slag aggregates have been utilised in this project. (Agency) Gujarat to teach Bhagavad Gita from class 6 Education minister Jitu Vaghani told the Gujarat assembly that the state government has decided to introduce teaching of Bhagavad Gita from class 6 from the coming academic year. Children studying in schools will learn to recite shlokas and write essays on the Bhagavad

Senior IPS officer Arun Bothra has left Twitter in stitches with his latest post.

Recently, Bothra, Transport Commissioner of Odisha, shared a picture of a suitcase filled with green peas. He revealed that the picture was taken at Jaipur airport, where security officials asked him to open his hand baggage for further inspection, possibly after scanners picked up something unusual inside. Opening the suitcase revealed that it was choc-a-bloc full of fresh peas - bought at Rs 40 per kilogram, the IPS officer said. "Security staff at Jaipur airport asked to open my handbag," he captioned the picture, adding a poker-face emoji at the end. It is not clear whether Bothra was joking or not, but his post has definitely amused social media users. Take a look: The pic has gone viral with over 48,000 'likes' and hundreds of amused reactions. IAS officer Awanish Sharan shared his own experience of carrying vegetables in flights. Parveen Kaswan, a Forest Service officer, wondered if it was a case of smuggling peas in a lighthearted tweet. And when one Twitter user said that he bought 10 kilos of green peas at the rate of Rs 40 per kg in the capital of Rajasthan, Jaipur, Bothra said "same". The incident also inspired several puns - IAS officer Priyanka Shukla called it a "mutter" of grave concern. "Hope it didn't affect your peas of mind," a Twitter user said. (Agency)

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

13

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

in brief NO FREE-RANGE EGGS IN BRITAIN FROM MONDAY In the UK, free-range eggs will no longer be available for the consumers as birds have not been allowed outdoors since November due to fears of avain flu outbreaks.

Henceforth, eggs that are sold in shops will have to carry a sticker or a label that says "barn eggs".

The name is given to eggs that are produced by hens who are permanently housed indoors. The government officials have called it as the “largest ever outbreak of avian flu” this winter, with more than 80 reported outbreaks in England. As a result of which, the UK government has ordered to keep the birds that are reared for meat and eggs, indoors since November to reduce the risk of outbreaks. Because the eggs have been kept indoors for the longer time, they can now no longer be labelled as free-range.

Farmers hoped that the Government will lift the housing order but after new avian flu outbreaks, officials have decide to keep the order in place.

LITTER OFFICER CLAIMS OF STAFF TARGETING MINORITIES, DISMISSED Former litter enforcement officer, Gary Forrester is planning on suing his former employer after he was sacked for whistleblowing and his claims of Kingdom targeting minorities were dismissed.

He told an employment tribunal that staff at Kingdom Services Group were asked to target ethnic minorities with fines as they were unlikely to challenge penalties and were less inclined to understand UK law.

The 39-year-old said that the staff were under “daily threat” of getting fired for not issuing enough fixed penalty notices (FPNs). The tribunal dismissed his other allegations, of unfair dismissal and racial discrimination. Mr Forrester, of Bromley, was associated with the Kingdom from February to November 2020 and was usually based in Barnet. Meanwhile Kingdom denied targeting ethnic minorities and disputed the claim that Mr Forrester was a whistleblower, saying that any 'protected disclosures' he made were simply attempts to prevent a disciplinary process brought against him.

UK DRINKING WATER CONTAINS HIGH LEVELS OF TOXIC PFAS A BBC study found out PFAS- known as “forever chemicals”- levels exceed European safety levels in almost half of the samples taken, however, none exceeded the current UK safety level. The chemicals are found in many products such as non-stick pans, food packaging, carpets, furniture, and firefighting foam. They have been linked to a range of diseases, including cancer.

As per the guidelines from the UK Drinking Water Inspectorate, drinking water must contain PFAS chemicals at no more than 100 nanograms per litre (ng/l).

Working with Greenwich University, the BBC took 45 tap water samples, of which 25 samples did contain PFASs, and four had levels that exceeded 10ng/l. And almost half of the samples exceeded the European Food Standards Agency tolerable limit of 2.2ng/l.

JAB WILL BUILD ‘GLOBAL WALL OF IMMUNITY’ Two years ago, Prof Sir Andrew Pollard joined forces with a colleague, Prof Dame Sarah Gilbert, and together they launched one of the greatest medical missions in modern history. The seemingly impossible task was completed in less than 12 months, giving relief to millions of people.

According to estimates, the jab ChAdOx1 nCoV19 has saved more than a million lives, but its reputation was battered by a toxic mix of misinformation, miscommunication and mishaps.

Vaxzevria or Covishield, the miracle jab that was worked on for two years by Pollard, Gilbert and their teams, has been sidelined in the UK and Europe and snubbed in the US. Instead, ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 is gearing up for what will probably be its final act: saving the rest of the world.

Parents of student killed in Clerkenwell pay tribute Alarm was raised at Arbour House, Clerkenwell, when a 19-year-old woman was found with neck injuries at student accommodation in central London.

Paramedics were unable to revive her and she was pronounced dead at the scene. Her next of kin had been informed.

The student has been identified as Sabita Thanwani. Ms Thanwani, a psychology student at City University, was found dead at her student accommodation in the early hours of Saturday morning after suffering what police described as "serious neck injuries".

Following a man hunt lasting from the early hours to Sunday afternoon, officers arrested Maher Maaroufe, who they were searching for in connection with her death. Mr Maaroute, a Tunisian national of no fixed address, is not a student.

Police were called to Arbour House on Sebastian Street in Clerkenwell, east London, at around 5.10am by a member of the public. Officers then called London Ambulance Service.

The family of Sabita Thanwani, who live in Golders Green, north London, while paying tribute to the "beautiful, irreplaceable" 19-year-old, said "Sabita Thanwani was our daughter. Our angel. Her life, that we hoped would be long, was cut tragically short. She

was ripped away from those who loved her so very dearly; her mum, dad, brother, grandparents, extended family and friends.

Sabita was the most caring and loving person we have ever known. She inspired

Sabita Thanwani

us every day of her precious 19 years of life. Her mission was to help everyone. She was studying psychology at City University to make this happen.”

According to

her family members, “In her short life, she helped so many.

Sabita was pure and did not see bad in anyone, because there was no badness in her own awesome heart. We will never ever stop loving or missing our beautiful, irreplaceable Sabita.

The girl that was an angel upon the earth is now an angel in heaven.

MP gets emotional on meeting Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe Labour MP Tulip Siddiq for Hampstead and Kilburn, who campaigned for BiritshIraninan charity worker Zaghari-Ratcliffe for six years, narrated her “emotional” meeting with the latter. Shadow economic secretary to the Treasury recalled her meeting with the 43-year-old mum as Tulip Siddiq MP surreal.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe landed back on British from Iran in the early hours of Thursday after the UK finally agreed to settle a £400 million debt dating back to the 1970s.

Ms Siddiq said, “We knew we were going to meet each other and she had called me to say that I was one of the first people she wanted to see. So she came to West Hampstead and we hugged each other for ages and we were both quite tearful and it was quite emotional meeting her. She knew so much about me and I knew so much about her and she did thank me profusely but I said to her ‘it wasn’t me, this was a shared victory and everyone here in this community campaigned for you and,

William and Kate needed a stiff drink after terrifying tour in India The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge visited Kaziranga National Park, which homes tigers and elephants, during their 2016 visit to India.

During their visit, a 6.9 magnitude earthquake shook the neighbouring nation of Myanmar. As much as Myanmar was a longway from the park, tremors were reportedly felt at Kaziranga National Park. Royal reporters who joined the press pack were said to have been checking into hotels when the earthquake hit.

While the ground was literally shaking, trembling, The Duke and Duchess were out in a field, in a hut on stilts. It was a terrifying moment for them. William needed a stiff drink after that, as did Kate.

The Cambridges' spokesperson confirmed the couple were safe and well shortly afterwards.

The couple have embarked on a royal tour of the Caribbean at the moment as they hope to boost support for the Crown in the Commonwealth following Barbados' decision to become a republic. Prince William, Kate Middleton and son Prince George had previously been described as republican slayers after support for the Royal Family spiked following their visit to Australia.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe

obviously, full credit to Richard – he was the one who was relentless in his campaigning’.”

In April 2016, Ms Siddiq began campaigning for her release when Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s husband, Richard, came to her for help. She then became a constant support and a prominent voice for Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s

release.

Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested on security charges after being detained in 2016 at Imam Khomeini airport following a holiday visit to Iran, where she introduced her daughter to her parents.

However according to a BBC report Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe said it should never have taken the government so long to secure her release from prison in Iran.

She reportedly told a news conference she had been overwhelmed with emotion to be reunited with her family - husband and daughter, describing the reunion as precious.

14

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Women on Boards opens entries for its 2022 Bursary Programme T

he Women on Boards Bursary Programme, with the generous support of Sheryl Cuisia and a group of experienced Chairs, is now open for emerging female non-executive directors – across all sectors. Now in its fourth year, the programme will award six women, who would not otherwise be able to afford it, complimentary places on its signature Boardroom Journey, worth up to £1,500.

Entries opened on International Women’s Day (IWD) on 8 March 2022 and close on 31 March 2022. This year’s IWD theme is breaking the bias, calling on us all to challenge stereotypes and bias in our communities, schools, and in our workplaces.

Women on Boards’ purpose is to challenge bias in the workplace and to accelerate board diversity by supporting as many women as possible to overcome the hurdles to contribute their skills and perspective as non-executive directors. What they do works, with eight members gaining a new board role every week (on average).

Its 2022 Bursary Programme is open to all female, non-binary and transgender people aspiring to achieve their leadership potential. It doesn’t matter how old you are or what your experience is – if you’re ambitious, motivated to succeed, and passionate about pursuing a non-executive director role, then you’re the perfect applicant for this bursary scheme.

Winners will be given a place on the

W

Tread with care

H

Afshan Moeed

Boardroom Journey worth up to £1,500 and one year’s membership to Women on Boards, including access to its Vacancy Board and more.

Afshan Moeed from Edinburgh is an internationally experienced Analyst with an extensive background in Banking, Investments and Financial Services. She has recently completed her PhD (Accounting & Finance) at the University of Glasgow. Currently, she is working as Lecturer in Accounting and Financial Management at Open University, UK. Afshan won the Women on Boards Bursary Programme in 2021. Here’s our exclusive Q&A with her: ow did you get to know about the annual Bursary programme?

As part of my PhD project, I did lots of research on the accountability, governance, and risk assessments associated with NED appointments. I became immersed in the world of Boards and knew that one day I wanted to be a NED. I saw an advertisement on

H

LinkedIn for the Women on Boards Bursary programme and felt inspired to enter. I was so happy to win! hat kind of preparation does it take to qualify and win it?

Do your research to make sure you truly understand the role of a NED. I found it helpful to read and listen to other women’s stories. The application form is easy to follow, and it doesn’t matter what your experience is. The key is to demonstrate that you’re ambitious and motivated to succeed. ow can more women in leadership positions sustain their stature without worrying about pay disparity and sexism?

During my time on the Bursary programme, I learned that self-promotion and making your achievements known is key for advancing and sustaining a woman’s career. One way of doing this is to keep a record of all the extra projects you have done, examples of when you have gone above and beyond and positive feedback you have received. hat difference can a woman make in a boardroom with her intervention?

Diversity whether it’s based on gender, age, ethnicity is always a good thing because it brings different perspectives into the Boardroom. Women and men make equally good NEDs, what’s important is to have a mix of genders. I find that women often look at things in more depth and make very considered decisions, which is important. hat kind of women/girls can apply?

Do they have to belong to a certain educational background?

It’s open to women of all ages and experiences. It doesn’t matter what stage of your career you’re at and the application doesn’t ask you to list your educational background. I can’t recommend it enough, the help and guidance you get are invaluable. Go for it!

To enter the Women on Boards 2022 Bursary Programme, visit www.womenonboards.net

W

W

#BeVisible celebrates visible differences and beauty beyond convention

Rohit Vadhwana Have you come across a situation where the prices are higher, but services are below average? A costly vacation booked for a week, turns out to be a substandard arrangement; or a romantic dinner booked with your husband on his promotion, gives you a complete disappointment in terms of food taste and service standard, even a disastrous experience?

Normally, we tend to believe that we pay price for better quality and services. Mostly it works out, but in some situation, you pay more and get less. This feels like cheating. Paying more in expectation of getting something better is not a vanity, it is a reasonable assumption. But not getting the worth of price paid is upsetting.

This happens not only in financial transactions, but sometimes in personal relationship as well. Expecting someone to be a good friend, you do a lot, out of the way, and it turns out that in the time of your need, there is complete indifference. Relatives expect a lot, as a matter of right, and when you say no, it is taken like a crime. With relatives also, in case you decide to do more than required from your side, and afterwards they turn eyes away, it gets bitter. How many of you have spent time, money and energy with a girl of your liking, to disappointingly hear, that she always considered you 'just a friend'?

Whether it is a restaurant, or a vacation or a relationship, how do we know what is worth of what? In case there is a formula to find it out before hand, perhaps we will not pay more price and won't invest more than required time and energy in any relationship. But that's really a utopian idea. Some economist, scientist or psychologists might have a chance to get a Nobel prize by doing a full proof research on this. Or may be some technocrat is developing an app which can guide us through in such financial and emotional transactions. But till then, as they say, investment is always risky, and return may not match the expectation or projection. So, tread slowly and carefully.

(Expressed opinions are personal)

Continuing to challenge disences through the personal moment in the lucrative South than being portrayed criminatory tropes in the Global accounts of six, remarkable women Asian personal care industry by celas victims or villains.

Beauty & Personal Care of substance. ebrating real and authentic women Recognising this, Industry, heritage, South Asian The ground-breaking camand individuals through the chalVatika UK continues hair care brand, Vatika UK, has paign has come to fruition by gallenges they have overcome. to pave the way for launched its next, visionary camvanising the conceptual talents of Deconstructing insurmountable positive change and paign that celebrates positive award-winning, brand marketing ‘values’ that the personal care & representation. body image and the visible difagency, Ethnic Reach; direction by beauty industry has historically #BeVisible marks ferences among us. The inspirBritish Asian actor and director prescribed and perpetuated, Vatika the next chapter to foling #BeVisible campaign proAmeet Chana and Vikrant Chopra; UK’s #BeVisible campaign now low the brand’s awardmotes diversity and inclusion in and music score by recording sets an entirely new benchmark in winning and visionary the Beauty & Personal Care artist, Rishi Rich. With powerful beauty promotion and imaging by #StrongerRoots camIndustry by telling the stories of Anoushe Husain, Prisha Bathia, Harshi Gudhka, Tulsi Vagjiani, paign, which signified images by photography duo, Amit advocating stronger representaAngela Selavarajah and Shani Dhanda six, formidable women who & Naroop. tion of people with visible differa game-changing identify as having a visible, physignored by brands; two ical difference. out of three people do Nearly one in five people in the not think visible differUK self-identify as having a visible ences are represented difference, yet South Asian brands well in adverts; and one barely reflect and represent people diately recognised the importance of in five will avoid pho- It has been a great news month for Sangeeta that look different or are disfigured the subject and the fact that Sangeeta tos with family and Waldron, author, and owner of Serendipity PR in some way – continuing to circuwould be able to offer a unique perfriends because of the & Media. Her latest book, Corporate Social late archaic and regressive notions spective on it. The book’s shortlisting way they look. Personal Responsibility Is Not Public Relations has been of what is deemed ‘beautiful’. in this year’s Business Books Award is networks, celebrities shortlisted by the UK Business Book Awards Visible differences can be clear evidence of both its quality and and social media are 2022, in the Change and Sustainability categodescribed as a scar, mark or condioverall contribution to the CSR conthe three biggest influ- ry. The book contains 15 global interviews tion on the face or body that makes versation.” The Awards will be ences that impact the from thought and business leaders who share an individual look different such as announced on 16 May at ceremony in way people feel about their knowledge about corporate social vitiligo, alopecia or other noticecentral London. their appearance. responsibility (CSR) and how it is driving busiable skin diseases or impairments.

Sangeeta has also been awarded a Consistently bothered ness. The book also has a special chapter on It can be difficult to maintain selfcommendation by the Women in by the personal care & India. worth and significance in a world Marketing, for Storyteller of The Year Eight books are shortlisted in this category beauty industry and where standards of beauty and Award and is in recognition of the stowider representation, and Sangeeta says, “To be shortlisted is an physical appearance are largely ries Sangeeta writes about and the podcasts she does, which people strongly feel important moment for me and the book. It gives the book exclusive and unidentifiable to the are about CSR, climate change, women’s empowerment… there is a greater need immediate authority and I hope people will buy the book to individual. which she says are the “things that matter.” for more actors with find out why it has earned its place here, alongside the other According to research, over 50 Corporate Social Responsibility Is Not Public Relations is visible differences to great titles in this category.” percent of people with visible difavailable on https://www.amazon.co.uk/Corporate-SocialMartin Liu, Publisher, LID Publishing comments, “When play positive and cenferences feel they are regularly Responsibility-Public-Relations/dp/1911671421 tral characters rather Sangeeta first discussed the book project with us, we imme-

Sangeeta Waldron’s latest book shortlisted by the UK Business Book Awards 2022

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

15

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

Difficult roads lead to some beautiful destinations Shefali Saxena Red Loon is an exciting new condiment brand with two unique and authentic products, created by Solihull-based audiologist, Raspal Kaur. Drawing on Raspal’s own heritage, RedLoon products are based on genuine recipes that have been passed down through the generations of Raspal’s family for nearly 80 years. Now Raspal is revealing the secret culinary power of these store cupboard essentials to the nation and hoping to make RedLoon the go-to seasoning for the masses. In an exclusive interview with Asian Voice, she spoke about her journey.

When and how did you come up with the idea of RedLoon?

It was during lockdown when my mother was stuck in India that the idea to create the RedLoon brand first came to light. I was sat across the table from my son eating lunch and my son commented on how we used my mum’s special mix of spices every day and how he reckoned everyone would love the product if they had the opportunity to try it. Our supply of RedLoon was beginning to run low and given the fact that my mother was marooned in India, the thought

occurred that we might actually need to replenish the supplies ourselves. And of course, that sowed the seed of ‘what if I created the product and brought it to market’ …

How challenging is it to juggle work and home as a single mother? Do you think it changes anything for a woman?

As a single mother, it’s a juggling act most days and I have learnt the need to be independent and ensure I am organized. Plenty of ‘to do’ lists feature in my life and I’m an expert at diary planning. I also ensure I leave time for contingency planning. I am a completer finisher in all my tasks so I like to have a ‘get on with it’ attitude rather than wait for someone to help me.

Thankfully, I am blessed with a fantastic support network of family and friends, and I believe the important social bonds this represents are much needed in any endeavour in life.

As an entrepreneur during the pandemic, what kind of strategy did you have to apply in order to sustain?

As a startup, it was hard transitioning from audiology to setting up a food business. I felt baby steps

were best in order to understand the bigger picture. I did not have the luxury of trial and error but had to hit the ground running.

That is not to say I did not fall – of course, I’ve fallen not just once but many times – but what’s key is to keep getting up, dusting yourself down and starting over again – no matter how tough it seems.

Starting up during a pandemic is especially challenging, with the added barriers of scarcer cash reserves, and smaller margins to help ride out any slump in sales.

But you simply have to adapt to the new rules and be mindful of the revised risks. I had to conduct a proper assessment of fixed and variable expenses, as well as the usual revenue and, this helped me in terms of contingency planning.

The main difficulty was trying to ascertain how long the covid situation would or could last and therefore, how long I needed to ride out these uncertain times.

How instrumental has your own mother been in inspiring the idea of RedLoon?

My mother has always been this very strong direct speaking individual who is never scared of saying things as they are. She has

The power of digital communication Digital creators launch a public awareness campaign against the world’s leading preventable killer - tobacco Over the years, tobacco consumption is becoming a big issue in India and yet there's so little happening to combat this.

According to Global Adult Tobacco Survey India, 2016-17, India is the second-largest consumer of tobacco - nearly 267 million adults (15 years and above) are users of tobacco in India. GATS states, mortality due to tobacco in India is estimated at upwards of 1.3 million.

Yuvaa is a thriving community of over 100,000 young people who are consistently engaged through content, campaigns and programs to initiate meaningful conversations in their communities. Their new initiative brings together ten young digital creators from across the country.

These digital creators include doctors, therapists, influencers and writers, all under 30 years of age, with a strong passion for health and well being.

This initiative aims to make use of social platforms to create engaging conversations on the harmful impact of tobacco consumption in a manner that is relatable and relevant to the youngsters of the country. To raise public awareness, these young digital content creators are creating 100 videos using #IndiaVsTobacco throughout the month of March including key moments like International Women’s Day, 8th March; National No Smoking Day, 11th March; and World TB Day, 24th March. In an attempt to spread awareness about the harms that tobacco causes, these content creators launched their first videos on International Women’s

Jigyasha Sharma

Day and No Smoking Day. The idea for #IndiaVsTobacco came about from the national youth convening called Charcha Se Change organized as a collaboration between 40 plus youth organizations and Tata Memorial Center (TMC) on Republic Day. At the convening, Dr. Pankaj Chaturvedi, Head-and-Neck Cancer Surgeon, Tata Memorial Hospital highlighted the role that youth people can play for a tobacco-free India.

Jigyasha Sharma with over 1.4 million followers on MX Takatak, Jigyasa has created a loyal following. Her signature style is making videos on trending formats about dance, fitness and lifestyle that appeal to a young demographic.

“I was surprised to hear how much women consume smokeless tobacco products. It's culturally accepted and encouraged across India. However, it becomes important to counter this culture of tobacco consumption by sharing widely about the

Falak Joshipura

harmful effects and the financial burdens it can cause in the long term. I've been encouraging women in my community to openly talk about their experiences and stories of how tobacco has affected them,” Jigyasha told Asian Voice.

Dr Falak Joshipura is a 22year-old influencer, juggling multiple hats at once! She is a doctor but also creates social media content on personal growth, health and lifestyle tips. Speaking to Asian Voice, she said, “As a woman digital creator who uses her social media platforms to share her interests and passions, I had to be part of an initiative like this to give back to society by focusing on health and wellbeing content. While sharing about the harmful effects of tobacco consumption through my social channels, my hope is that my followers will understand the gravity of the situation. I hope these videos reach many more people and encourage more conversation for tobacco-free India.”

been a soldier throughout her years, bringing up five children and adapting to a new life in the UK at the tender age of 18. When she first came to the UK, she didn’t even speak English but yet she adopted a ‘can do’ attitude and embraced the dramatic change in culture. She, worked hard as a sewing machinist alongside being a busy mum to us all.

As a working mother and businesswoman, what is your advice to more women like you who are single parents, who dream of a business like yours?

My best advice is to start, procrastination was what I was good at but then I soon realized that I was simply stalling starting and once I got the bit between my teeth I was on a roll. Similar to when you agonize over going to the gym, but once you get there you love it and wonder why on earth it took you so long to get your act together!

Fear sets in when there is change and confidence build over time. Once you get over a few hurdles you start to see light at the end of the tunnel.

Yes, there are challenges and some late nights and juggling, but it is all worthwhile. There’s a steep learning curve too, however, I have always believed knowledge is power

Afshan Moeed

What was it like switching careers and what is your take on trained versus passionate entrepreneurs when it comes to the food industry?

I still have a foot in the door with my Audiology career, as like most people who have made the transition, in order to keep things lean and not be reliant on external funding, I am effectively juggling two jobs. Anyone can effectively start a new business, but you need to acknowledge that you won’t be good at every aspect of the operation, so bring onboard experts who have the knowledge and expertise to fill in the necessary gaps.

Patience is very important especially when mistakes are made which are costly. I know that difficult roads lead to some beautiful destinations.

Online Safety Bill is ‘huge missed opportunity’ Research shows that more than one in three women living in the UK which amounts to 11 million women - have been subjected to online abuse.

Charities are arguing that the legislation must explicitly reference violence against women and girls given the high levels of abuse they face on social media.

This comes at a time when research conducted by Refuge demonstrated more than one in three women living in the UK which amounts to 11 million women - have been subjected to online abuse or harassment on social media or another online platform. While researchers discovered this surged to a whopping 62 per cent of young women.

According to The Independent, Ruth Davison, chief executive of Refuge, the UK’s largest provider of

shelters for domestic abuse victims, said that the charity has tirelessly fought to influence the legislation noting it “presented a much-needed and overdue opportunity to improve women and girls' safety online”.

She added: “Sadly, the bill as it currently stands is a huge missed opportunity and our calls for violence against women and girls to be focused at the heart of this bill have not been heard, which is very disappointing.

“Our Unsocial Spaces report published last year showed the scale of abuse being committed against women and girls online and how, for too long, online spaces have been unregulated and unsafe for women and girls, with online abuse continuing to go unchecked.

This has a huge impact on the everyday lives of women and girls.”

Inspirational Afghan women visit Parliament for International Women’s Day A group of inspiring Afghan women have visited the Houses of Parliament to mark International Women’s Day and tell their own unique stories of success and integration.

At a reception hosted by Minister for Afghan Resettlement Victoria Atkins, a group of 12 Afghan women shared their incredible stories of living in the UK after leaving Afghanistan.

Among the women invited to parliament were: Benafsha Yaqoobi: An Afghan disability rights

activist; Arefa Shafaei: A Chevening scholar and Zahra Joya (founder of a media company called Rukhshana Media) along with her sisters Sabria Joya, Sharifa Joya and Fakhria Joya.

16

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Diversity and Inclusivity : More needs to be done

T

he UK can be proud of its excellent track record in promoting diversity and inclusivity at every level of society. In our schools and universities, in our workplaces, in sport, and in our uniformed and civil services we have covered much ground to embrace, respect and celebrate our differences and create a vibrant society which is woven in a rich tapestry of multicultural hues.

Sangeeta Waldron

W

e are all too aware that the world economy is facing a lot of challenges right now, and that we desperately need creative solutions. We also know from international data, that during this Covid-19 pandemic, that women have been negatively impacted the most, and that this wretched global pandemic has unravelled the progress made towards gender equality.

It is vital for all organisations to review, strengthen and to act on their diversity and inclusion strategies, because research also tells us that that innovation and resilience are characteristics that distinguish diverse and inclusive companies, who will be crucial as the global economy enters the third year of the pandemic.

More and more professionals under 35 are expected to prioritise personal values when they decide where to work, which means they may avoid companies without a diverse workforce, clear promotion track, and commitment to confront biases.

It is high time, now for all types of businesses and organisations step up, to take action for diversity and inclusion, for all companies to ‘be the change we desperately need to see’…it is 2022, and this type of authentic representation is long overdue. Lip service no longer cuts it.

Lip service no longer cuts it.

Editorial credit: Alexandros Michailidis / Shutterstock.com

Lord Raj Loomba CBE We witnessed communities break cultural barriers and work for hand in hand to overcome the recent pandemic. In recent weeks a number of people have opened their homes and welcomed with open arms those desperately fleeing the heart-rending human tragedy unfolding in Ukraine. Do we live in a perfect society? Sadly no, and much needs to be done.

At the same time, I genuinely believe that the vast majority of us are determined to see a society rid of the ills of racism, prejudice, inequality and bigotry, and the will of our people will prevail. While there is a role for government and civil society to promote diversity and bring about change, it is important for every individual to resolve to be the change and make a difference. I am delighted that Asian Voice is highlighting this urgent and pressing issue of our times through the Be the Change event at the House of Lords on 6th April.

Ensure that everyone’s voice is heard and considered

P

rofessor Jonathan AJ Wilson, Director of International Business, and Professor of Brand Strategy & Culture, at Regent’s University London is an awardwinning academic with two doctorates over 200 pieces of published material. He’s an acclaimed branding and communications strategist. In an exclusive interview, he speaks to Asian Voice about diversity and inclusion.

W

here do you think we stand in terms of putting theories of inclusion into practice for ethnic minorities?

Without question, things are getting better - but we still have so much further to go where we can truly celebrate inclusion and equity.

Do we live in a T perfect society?

Sadly no, and much needs to be done.

o 'Be The Change', should Britons learn more about the British Raj and colonial rule in India to understand the dilemma of the minorities better?

Absolutely! It’s such a crucial part of British history. Also, we have to ensure that in doing so, those narratives are told from a number of perspectives and voices, and we don’t compress them, no

Prof Jonathan AJ Wilson matter how uncomfortable that may be - because we share a bloody past. Stories like the East India Company - where the trade of tea, monopolies, armies, war, slavery, and financial incentives to marry natives would make for some eyeopening reading. Sadly, the legacy and parallels of which could still be drawn today in places.

W

hat must be done to diversify teams in UK board rooms?

On one level, the mathematical documentation and addressing of

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

17

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

The pendulum had to swing to find its balance a firm believer in Satvik food and her father practised kundalini yoga and meditation. In an exclusive interview with Asian Voice, Anita shared her perspective on how we as a community must approach diversity and inclusion and the role of women from ethnic minorities in being the change.

Below are some excerpts from our

Q&A:

W

Anita Kaushal

A

nita Kaushal (of Indian origin) is the co-founder of Mauli Rituals; a British brand of self-care products, inspired by her Ayurvedic heritage. Her grandmother was a herbalist and a midwife and taught plant medicine and massage. Her mother was

underrepresentation have to be both undertaken and addressed. Representation is about visible representation, along with experience. People who are qualified, certified and verified.

People who have done the air-miles and been active in enforcing change for the full socioeconomic pyramid. We need to ask the question, do organisations practice what they preach?

Also, we should be under any illusions that these people from underrepresented communities and the global majority do not exist. There are plenty of able and over-qualified professionals ready to take up the challenge - but not enough of them are given a chance or supported.

W

hat role does digital culture play in building perception and manufacturing consent about diversity and inclusion?

Digital culture gives us opportunities to produce rich content with frequency in a cost-effective way, bringing in more intergenerational cross-border communication - in realtime, all of the time.

Importantly, it also offers a long-tail socioeconomic

e’re in 2022, and conversations around women empowerment and feminism are happening more than ever, yet there’s a lack of diversity and inclusion on boards. Why do think this is the case?

A

s a woman, what would your advice be to other women and men to nurture inclusion and promote diversity in businesses without bias?

To anyone hiring, I would say, we live in a multifaceted, multi-cultural world and are all the better for it. If you want to be relevant as a business and to speak to your potential customers, consider hiring from all walks of life – not only do you have a duty to do so, your business will be better for it in every way.

It’s a joy to see women empowerment and south Asians having such a strong voice now and with that, the lack of diversity and inclu-

trail where we can track and document progress.

And crucially, we can see who comes out just for religious and cultural milestones in the calendar with an advertising post but does little else in terms of recruiting and retaining

Women in boardroom

positive discrimination and while I’m not in favour of that, the pendulum had to swing to find its balance.

C

ould you please share some stories and experiences around inclusion and change for our readers?

The controversial statue of Robert Clive from East India Company in Whitehall

Stories like the East India Company where the trade of tea, monopolies, armies, war, slavery, and financial incentives to marry natives would make for some eye-opening reading.

sion on boards will become broader. My generation was generally discouraged from applying for board level roles and that was as much from our society as it was from the boards themselves. This means fewer role models for the current generation, but fortunately, things are changing and the very fact we are having this conversation is testimony to that.

Firstly, women need to find mentors they can relate to, then have the confidence to put themselves forward and finally, they must be the very best for the role. Now we see

representative staff.

H

ow can brands leverage growth by giving more opportunities to ethnic minorities?

I teach students and professionals that strong brands tell a story, paint a picture and make a promise – and their reputations are built upon a continuous fulfilment of those promises. If you can’t do those things, then you run the risk of being called out - but in most instances, people disengage and remain silent. In each of those scenarios, you lose audiences and money – and it costs a lot more and takes a lot more time to win trust back. To avoid these, make sure you have a diversity of experi-

ence and opinions. Then, when you do, ensure that everyone’s voice is heard and considered. This is not as easy as you think. We’ve all been the minority who never gets to make their real, honest, and insightful point, or is afraid of losing their job if they do.

Representation is about visible representation, along with experience.

Having started my career in a male-dominated sales environment, I was not only one of a handful of females, I was also Asian. I do recall, as I have throughout my career that it was not as easy for me to be given opportunities as others, but I believed then as I believe now if you work hard and get the job done, your actions will speak for yourself. I made more profit for my company than any male, and that could not go unnoticed, even if they wanted it to.

D

o you think inclusion and diversity are confined to ethnic women or do women as a community face this?

I believe there will always be some form of discrimination, be it around sex, colour, disability, social background, and it can be on a company bias or that of the individual doing the hiring.

Women need to find mentors they can relate to, then have the confidence to put themselves forward

18

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Dear Financial Voice Reader, Is the Stock Market Correction Over or Just Beginning?

After a turbulent start to 2022, it's time to evaluate where we are. Is the stock market overvalued or undervalued? Should we buy to dip or continue to re-risk like so many hedge funds? What is going on, and what does the data say?

The Fed The market spent last week recovering from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Then, this Monday, Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell suggested that the Fed could be more aggressive in lifting interest rates. Shortly after, the Dow Jones, Nasqud, and S&P 500 dropped between 0.5% to 1.1%.

The Fed's tightening of monetary policy was thought to have been built into market prices. However, Powell’s belief that beating inflation could require interest rate hikes of 0.5% rather than the traditional 0.25% has come as a surprise. With six more hikes promised this year, the markets are understandably edgy.

Many on Wall Street had proposed that The Fed was bluffing. This move indicates it's very serious about tackling inflation, even if that means stifling economic growth.

Has the Market Hit Bottom?

March the 12th was a difficult day for investors.

However, the S&P 500 (+5%) and the Nasdaq 100 (7%) are up in recent weeks. However, similar positive signs could be seen in February before the month closed badly.

But is this the bottom, or do we have further to go?

On the positive side, a lot of the information affecting stock prices is out in the open. The market understands that The Fed intends to end its accommodative monetary policy. Geopolitical risks, high valuations, inflation, and slow global growth are well documented. Additionally, corporations are well stocked with cash and should be able to survive a downturn.

On the other hand, inflation and slow economic growth will affect profitability. Supply chain problems — already an issue since the pandemic — have been aggravated by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

These negatives are reasonably significant, especially when allied with the Fed's stance this Monday. While it's not certain that we are set to head lower, we have reached a stage of heightened volatility.

Of course, all of this could present an opportunity.

The American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) released new figures that suggest that less than 1 in 4 investors has considered themselves bullish in the last 10 weeks. These numbers are some of the lowest since Brexit in 2016.

However, historical trends suggest that market pessimism like this is traditionally followed by positive returns on a 6 to 12-month basis.

Is the Market Overvalued?

Is the market overvalued? Well, it depends on who you listen to. The Buffet Indicator, which divides the Wilshire 5000 by the annual GDP, suggests that stocks are priced at near historic highs of 168%. The number is down from 202% last August.

While these figures are concerning, there are two caveats worth considering. Firstly, stocks have taken a hammering this year. Netflix and Meta are already down around 40% in 2022. Secondly, Buffett himself has been very busy, spending $12bn to buy the conglomerate Alleghany and $8bn to purchase a stake in the oil company Occidental.

All of this suggests that there is still value to be had.

However, some sectors will fare better than others.

Which Sectors Still Hold Value?

Depending on which metrics you look at, the Energy sector could still hold a lot of promise. It's up around 32% this year, but its P/E ratio is only around 11. Compared to the Tech (P/E 23.83) and Communications Sector (P/E 18.27), Energy looks undervalued.

However, compound annual growth rates – or CAGR – suggest Energy earnings will dip in the next few years.

On the other hand, they predict Consumer Discretionary (8.4%) and Industrials (7%) will rise. Communications are expected to grow by 6% during the same period, with Tech rising by 5%.

Conclusion Russia's invasion of Ukraine has deepened existing supply chain problems. However, just as the markets seemed to have absorbed these issues, the Fed announced very aggressive measures to curb inflation.

The Energy sector has had a great year. But there are still bargains to be found in the U.S. Oil and Gas industry.

Low capital spending combined with supply disruption and rising demand are positive signs. Several ETFs currently look attractive, like Energy Select (XLE) and the iShares Global.

Biggest rise in state pension as inflation rockets Bank of England policymakers have admitted that inflation is likely to be “several percentage points” higher than the 7.25 per cent it had previously forecast. Price growth is already on course to hit eight per cent by June and could top 10 per cent by the autumn.

The state pension should also rise in line with inflation next year, under the triple lock mechanism.

Pension is set to increase by almost £1,000 to £10,600 a year as inflation rockets, leaving Chancellor Rishi

ings or inflation, whichever is highest. From April, the new state pension will pay a maximum £185.50 a week, which works out as £9,627.80 a year. A 10 per cent inflationary uplift would increase that by an Rishi Sunak incredible £963 Sunak with a huge decision. from April 2023 to £10,591 a Introduced by the coaliyear. Under the triple lock, tion government in 2010, state pensioners would have the triple lock guarantees received a pay rise of more the state pension will rise than eight per cent from either by 2.5 per cent, earnApril 6. However, the

Department for Work Pensions argued that earnings had been 'skewed and distorted' by the pandemic, and refused to pass it on.

Instead, pensioners will get just 3.1 per cent rise next month. The Resolution Foundation, the living standards think tank, said that increasing the benefits by 8.1% rather than 3.1% would give much help to low-tomiddle income households.

The suggestions came before Sunak made final preparations for Wednesday’s statement.

Parents support majority of first time home buyers The number of first-time home buyers reportedly hit a 20-year peak in 2021. But how, one might be wondering, are people managing to buy when house prices continue to hit record highs? In a survey of 2,002 adults carried out in March 2022, it was found that just 41 per cent of home buyers say they did not receive any help from their parents. It also highlights how reliant

younger generations are on family wealth in order to get on the property ladder.

Among those aged 4554, more than 75 per cent say they did not receive family help when buying their first home. In recent years the Conservatives have devoted much time, energy and money to increasing the number of first-time buyers.

That was, after all, the sole intention of George

Osborne’s Help to Buy scheme. However, with house prices still going up, it looks like family wealth is still a key factor in home ownership. This data suggests that those who do escape the rent trap are often being supported by family members.

Looks like life is getting harder for those who have the least in Britain’s housing market right now.

However, if one can get a deposit together to buy a place of your own it seems like things might be on the up, sort of. One thing is sure that buying a home is becoming no more affordable or realistic without family help. If prices continue to rise, this will only further divide younger generations into two camps: those with wealthy parents and those without.

Sunak says sanctions 6,000 post offices face against Russia not cost-free closure or sell off Ahead of next week's spring statement, Rishi Sunak said that he would 'stand by' people, but warned sanctions against Russia were not 'cost-free.' He is facing calls from some Tory MPs to cut fuel duty to help ease rising costs at the pumps.

The shadow chancellor has said the government should also be taxing oil and gas companies to fund more generous energy discounts for poorer families.

The spring statement is not usually an occasion to announce big tax and spending decisions. However, this year Sunak is facing pressure to act on living standards amid soaring energy costs and rising household bills due to increasing inflation.Sunak is facing calls from more than 50 MPs to cut fuel duty, which has been frozen for over a decade, to reduce the price of petrol and diesel. Others within his party have been calling for the government to scrap VAT on energy bills - while some want green levies removed to reduce costs.

Average house price tops £350,000 The property website said that the average price of a house hit £354,564 in March, up 1.7% or £5,760 compared with February. It was the biggest monthly rise in 18 years, and pushed the annual rate of growth in asking prices to 10.4%.

Annual growth was above 10% for all regions and countries except London and Scotland. The jump in asking price was partly driven by a huge mismatch between supply and demand, with more than twice as many buyers as sellers. For those putting their house on the market, the chance of finding a buyer in the first week is higher than it has ever been for this time of year, and twice as likely compared with the same period in 2019. The house owners are asking for higher prices as the demand for larger houses with four bedrooms or more rose by 3.4 per cent. The trend also encouraged new sellers to come to market, with 12% more new listings in this sector than at this time last year.

Thousands of post offices are either being sold or axed under secret plans to streamline the scandal-hit business, campaigners believe. It is being claimed that authorities want to offload up to 6,000 lossmaking branches and turn the Post Office into a John Lewis-style 'mutual' company.

This will help to draw a line under the IT fiasco that saw thousands of sub-postmasters wrongly accused of

stealing from their branches. Due to this, the taxpayer is left with a bill of up to £1 billion in compensation and legal fees and the Post Office looking for new ways to secure its future.

Ex-postmistress Sally Stringer who ran a post office in Beckford, Gloucs, for 20 years, said she was stunned when officials discussed scaling down the state-owned network. She added that such closures would be wrong.

Disabled with lifelong conditions will have more financial security Disabled people on the highest components of the new benefit and whose needs are highly unlikely to change will be eligible for an “indefinite award”. In effect, this will mean they will not be subject to reviews and can rely on their new benefit in the long term.

Social security minister Ben Macpherson said: “The

Ministers under pressure over the cost of living crisis More than 50 charities have warned that the consequences of driving through a below-inflation benefit pay rise in April will be “unthinkable” for households already struggling to cover soaring food and energy costs and a rise in national insurance.

The UK Ministers are coming under growing pressure to intervene to soften the impact of the cost of living crisis amid fresh warnings that millions of low-income households risk sliding into further debt, hunger and poverty. Meanwhile, the former prime minister Gordon Brown warned that anxiety over the cost of living crisis had replaced the pandemic as the biggest source of worry in the public’s minds. The government is understood to be reluctant to commit to extra spending but is said to acknowledge concerns over the critical “starve or freeze” choices faced by low-income families as energy and food bills soar way beyond incomes.

introduction of indefinite awards, as part of Adult Disability Payment, underlines our commitment to deliver on the principles of Scotland’s social security system to treat people with dignity, fairness and respect. In making this decision, we have engaged with a wide range of people with lived experience of the current system and will continue to listen as we design and build a social security system that works for disabled people.

Morna Simpkins, director of MS Society Scotland, commented: “We are pleased the Scottish Government has listened to the views of the MS community and MS Society Scotland and will re- introduce indefinite awards.

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

www.asian-voice.com

FINANCE & REAL ESTATE

19

26 March - 1 April 2022

Adani's wealth jumps by $49 bn, higher than Jeff Bezos Gautam Adani, India's and Asia's second-richest person, added $49 billion to his wealth last year - more than the net addition of wealth by the top three global billionaires Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Bernard Arnault, the 2022 M3M Hurun Global Rich List said. Mukesh Ambani, who runs the oil-to-retail conglomerate Reliance Industries, continues to be the richest Indian with a wealth of $103 billion, a 24 per cent rise year on year.

Adani, the head of the

ports-to-energy conglomerate Adani Group, is a close second, with his wealth surging 153 per cent to $81 billion. In the last 10 years, while Ambani's wealth has grown 400 per cent, Adani has seen a 1,830 per cent increase, the list said.

HCL's Shiv Nadar is ranked third with USD 28 billion wealth, followed by Serum Institute's Cyrus Poonawalla ($ 26 billion) and steel magnate Lakshmi N Mittal ($25 billion). After listing renewable energy company Adani Green, his

wealth increased nearly five times to $81 billion from $17 billion in 2020.

Ambani's wealth grew

by USD 20 billion in 2021, it said.

Nykaa founder Falguni Nayar ($7.6 billion) is the wealthiest new entrant in the Hurun Global Rich List 2022.

The statement said that the 2022 M3M Hurun Global Rich List ranked 3,381 billionaires from 2,557 companies and 69

Gautam Adani

countries.India has 215 billionaires compared to 1,133 Chinese billionaires and 716 Americans.

Tata Motors all set to acquire Ford’s Sanand plant Decks have been cleared for Tata Motors’ takeover of Ford India’s passenger vehicle manufacturing plant in Sanand. Both the companies have submitted a consented proposal for transfer of ownership of Ford’s Sanand plant to Tata Motors. In all likelihood, a high-power committee (HPC) appointed by the state government will give a nod to the proposal, clearing the way for Tata Motors’ takeover of the plant at the earliest.

Both the companies have been in talks soon after the American auto major announced its exit from India last year. “An HPC was formed by the government of Gujarat in April 2018 to resolve issues related to implementation of large projects. The committee is chaired by the chief minister. During the HPC meeting scheduled next week, the proposal of Ford India to transfer its vehicle assembly plant at Sanand to

Tata Motors and issues related to the transfer will be discussed at length and finalised,” said a source.

It remains to be seen whether Tata Motors will enjoy the exceptional incentives and benefits it had given at the time of starting the Nano plant at Sanand for the new plant it is set to acquire. A decision will be taken on whether the company will get added

benefits or same that were extended to Ford India. Ford Motor Company had invested £450 million to set up the plant with a capacity to manufacture 240,000 units and 270,000 engines per annum. The company has accumulated operating losses of around $2 billion in India in the last decade.

Suzuki to invest £1.04 bn Lenders okays takeover of debt-ridden Sintex by RIL in Gujarat to power Maruti's EV drive After being a late mover in the green mobility space, India’s largest carmaker Maruti is set to unleash massive investments and new cars in the electric vehicles space with its Japanese parent Suzuki committing £1.04 billion for zero emission vehicles and batteries.

The investments will be made at Suzuki’s plant in Gujarat, which recently bagged benefits under the government’s productionlinked incentive (PLI) scheme, and is likely to see vehicles and batteries being produced for the requirements of Maruti Suzuki as well as Toyota, Suzuki’s alliance partner for the Indian market.

Maruti, which is at least two years away from launch its first mainline electric vehicle, is looking to take on

Indian heavyweights Tata Motors and Mahindra & Mahindra, as well as traditional rival Hyundai and its group company Kia. Suzuki’s plans for electrics were announced as part of Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s India visit with the company signing an MoU with Gujarat on Saturday. The biggest chunk of the fresh funds will be spent towards the battery plant that will see £730 million being invested with a production target of 2026.

Electric vehicles will see investments of £310 million with a production target of 2025.

Maruti Suzuki Toyotsu, a joint venture between Suzuki and Toyota Tsusho for vehicle dismantling and scrapping, will also see £4.5 million investments for a plant that will be operational by 2025.

Lenders to the debt-ridden Sintex Industries have approved Reliance Industries’ over £365 million bid for the Gujarat-based company. RIL, which has partnered stressed asset buyer Assets Care & Reconstruction Enterprise (ACRE) for the Sintex bid, has also offered a 15% equity to lenders. The RIL-ACRE resolution plan now needs the approval of NCLTAhmedabad. The grouping has proposed to write off the entire equity capital of Sintex and delist the stock from the bourses. This means that equity investors who own the Sintex stock will see their capital reduced to zero.

In a regulatory filing, Sintex said: “All four resolution plans were put for e-voting for approval by the creditors and the resolution plan submitted

by RIL jointly with ACRE has been approved by 100%

of the creditors. “It further said that according to the RIL-ACRE resolution plan, it is proposed that the existing share capital of the company shall be reduced to zero and the company will be delisted from the BSE and the NSE. The resolution professional has admitted claims of £771.9 million from financial creditors, £7.4 million from operational creditors and £1.1 million from employees of Sintex. The Gujaratbased company, incorporated in 1931 as The Bharat Vijay Mills, reported a loss of £44.2 million on revenue of £207.7 million in the first nine months of FY22.

Future Retail to act against takeover of its stores by Reliance Future Retail (FRL) said it is “committed” to reversal of takeover of its stores by Reliance Retail and will initiate all such action as may be necessary to seek value adjustments. The Kishore Biyani-led firm also said the action of the Reliance Group has come as a “surprise” to it.

Moreover, the action of taking possession of its stores has “complicated” the

positive scenario which had started building up after a CCI order in December 2021, FRL said in aregulatory filing.

In February, Reliance Retail took over the operations of at least 300 stores of FRL and offered jobs to its employees after the group failed to make lease payments to landlords.

“FRL’s board has taken strong objection to of such

action by Reliance and has put the group to notice to reconsider all other actions initiated over the last few days,” it added. FRL’s board has also notified Reliance that assets such as store fixtures, store infrastructure, merchandise, inventory, etc belonging to FRL and lying inside these stores are hypothecated as security in favour of FRL’s lenders. “The board has called upon

Reliance to ensure that the possession of the secured assets is not transferred and retained unharmed for the benefit of lenders,” it added.

According to FRL, there have been several media reports and public notices issued by Amazon misreporting that FRL has handed over its retail assets to Reliance in breach of orders of arbitration tribunal of SIAC and the SC.

The Tail Wagging The Dog

Suresh Vagjiani, Sow & Reap Properties Ltd

We just completed a bridging loan on Friday. Our remit from our client was, by hook or by crook, the deal must be done on that particular Friday. They had approached us after exchange, and when the completion had been set.

The reason for choosing this date was because it was Holi. The property being purchased was no ordinary property, its usage was an ashram/retreat centre in the holy isle of Avalon, Glastonbury.

The purchase was being funded in whole by an English man. He had been inspired to follow a spiritual path, and this was his contribution; something the lender’s lawyer could not get her head around. Not that it should have been any of her business.

In order to expedite the transaction we chose a private bridger who dispensed with the need for a valuation.

Relative to the purchase price the loan was very small.

Nearly all lenders, private or otherwise, insist on doing a valuation. The only question a lender is concerned with is in the event of a default and repossession can they get the principal and the interest back? As long as the title is clear, and the loan to value is low enough there should be no issues.

We have done several transactions with this lender, for this very reason; a useful instrument to have in one’s arsenal especially when purchasing during a lockdown, when no valuer was prepared to come out for a valuation.

This could be the difference between doing and not doing a deal.

The lender’s lawyer had fired off 25 questions to the purchaser’s lawyer the week before, and simultaneously advised the completion should be postponed to later.

We have done a bridge in three days, which included a weekend; from Friday to Monday. Therefore, this really wasn’t necessary in my opinion. I feel that many of the questions are for the lawyer to cover themselves from forever being sued. In my opinion, it seems this is their agenda, not always in the commercial interest of the client.

If you give them the extra time they desire, rest assured they will find a way to fulfil it, and be able to justify it.

If you stand firm with the completion date, and drill down on each question, there could be a chance. This was the stance taken. Some of the questions were to do with the usage class, this frankly is not the lender’s lawyer’s business. It’s to do with the buyer and the council. This is not Westminster or Kensington & Chelsea. It’s a pretty laid back part of the UK. By switching our role to one of an assistant we were able to either dismiss the questions asked or get them addressed. As this was a lender who was accessible and commercially minded we were able to progress through these quickly.

It was tight, but the deal was done on the desired, opportune day; just in time for the head guru to arrive on Monday to bless the premises.

India's direct tax kitty rises by 48% With a fortnight to go, India's direct tax collections have topped the revised estimates for the current financial year on the back of robust growth across corporation and personal income tax segments. Data released by the CBDT pegged the net collections at over £136 billion, over 9% higher than the revised estimates of £125 billion, and includes refunds of around £19 billion. The numbers showed collections up to March 16, 2022 were 48% higher than the corresponding period last year and 42% higher than the previous year.

On a gross basis (without accounting for refunds), the direct tax kitty is estimated to have expanded over 38% to £155 billion. “The direct tax collections are at record high. These numbers are

reflective of robust economic growth and the Indian economy is on track to surpass the prepandemic levels,” said Amit Singhania, a partner at law firm Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co. The higher collections mean that there is less pressure, from the resource point of view, to go ahead with the Life Insurance Corporation of India’s mega public issue as indirect tax mop up is also expected to be healthy.

Besides, the Centre is expected to spend lower than what it has budgeted for, especially on the revenue expenditure front.

Given the choppy market conditions, the government is all set to defer the LIC IPO until the next fiscal year without upsetting its fiscal calculations.

20

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

in brief

Pak PM rallies supporters ahead of no-trust vote ISLAMABAD: Pakistan PM Imran Khan turned to grassroot supporters, lobbying the poor and promising better hospital care as he faces a no-confidence motion in parliament. The challenge may be the biggest yet for the former cricket star turned Islamist leader since he came to power in 2018. opposition has The demanded Khan step down over his alleged failure to improve the country’s economy. Pakistan’s key opposition parties launched a formal noconfidence vote for Khan earlier this month. Asad Qaiser, speaker of the National Assembly, convened a special session for Friday to deliberate

whether Khan still has majority support in the house. Under the constitution, the parliament has three days to deliberate after which the lawmakers will vote, perhaps as early as Monday.

Khan has remained defiant, claiming he still enjoys the backing of the majority of lawmakers in the 342-seat house.

On Monday, Khan spoke to a gathering at a hospital in Islamabad, lauding his government’s efforts to provide free healthcare for the poor. He also defended his government’s performance, saying all economic indicators show improvement in Pakistan’s economy.

But recent mutinies from

within Khan’s own Pakistan Tehreek-eInsaf party could easily tip the scales against him. As many as 13 lawmakers from his party have indicated they could vote against him. After the 2018 election, Khan secured 176 votes in parliament to become PM. At a televised rally on Sunday, he urged the dissenters to come back, saying he would forgive them. Also, several lawmakers from parties allied with Khan opened talks last week with the opposition Pakistan Democratic Movement on a possible new realignment in parliament.

The votes of the dissenters

BIDEN NAMES PUNEET TALWAR AS ENVOY TO MOROCCO from Khan’s ranks have also become an issue. Pakistan’s President Arif Alvi asked the Supreme Court for guidance on whether their votes should be counted and considered valid.

Some law experts say those votes will be counted - even if the Election Commission later disqualifies them on complaints from Khan’s party. The opposition, which needs a simple majority of 172 votes to oust Khan, insists it has enough support.

Former Afghan finance minister now drives an Uber Khalid WASHINGTON: Payenda, the former finance minister of Afghanistan, who once oversaw a $6 billion budget, is now an Uber driver in Washington. Payenda fled the country a week before the insurgent group seized Kabul, telling the Washington Post that he left because he had a falling out with Afghan president Ashraf Ghani, who would himself flee the country as Taliban troops closed in.

Now, the former official, who was partly educated at US universities, teaches a class at Georgetown University for $2,000 a semester, and Ubers to

“Now that it’s over, we had 20 years and the whole world’s support to build a system that would work for the people. We miserably failed.

All we built was a house of cards that came down crashing this fast. A house of cards built on the foundation of corruption. Some of us in Khalid Payenda the government chose make ends meet. He blames to steal even when we had a Afghan leaders themselves, as slim, last chance. We betrayed well the Biden and Trump our people,” Payenda wrote on administrations, for creating the social media. dramatic collapse and ongoing The Trump administration’s difficulties inside Afghanistan. negotiations for a peace settle-

In cash-strapped Lanka, two men die waiting in queue for fuel COLOMBO: At least two people have died in Sri Lanka while waiting in long queues for fuel, officials say, as widespread shortages and skyrocketing prices cause misery and hardship across the island nation.

The men, in their seventies, died while they were waiting for petrol and kerosene in two different parts of the country, police spokesman Nalin Thalduwa said in Colombo. For weeks, Sri Lankans have been queueing up at pumps, often for hours as the country battles the worst economic crisis in its history as an independent nation, with a lack of foreign exchange to buy vital imports shrinking the supply of essential goods.

Motorists are forced to wait for hours outside filling stations for petrol and the government has imposed rolling blackouts as power utilities are unable to pay for enough foreign oil to meet demand.

Local media reports said multiple women standing in the hot sun to buy cooking gas had fainted at several locations across the island over the weekend. On Sunday, Sri Lanka suspended operations at its only fuel refinery after crude oil stocks ran out, said

Ashoka Ranwala, the president of the Petroleum General Employees’ Union.

The use of kerosene has increased after low-income families began shifting away from cooking gas due to price increases. On Sunday, Laugfs Gas, the country’s secondlargest supplier raised prices by 1,359 Sri Lankan rupees ($4.94) for a 12.5kg cylinder, the company said in a statement.

School exams cancelled Meanwhile, exams for millions of school students in the Western Province of the country ran out of printing paper with Colombo short on dollars to finance imports, according to officials. Education authorities said the term tests were postponed indefinitely due to an acute paper shortage as Sri Lanka contends with its worst financial crisis since independence in 1948.

IMF bailout The country announced that that it will seek an IMF bailout to resolve its worsening foreign debt crisis and shore up external reserves. The island nation secured a $1bn credit line from India to buy urgently needed food and medicine, officials said, after Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa’s visit to New Delhi.

ment with the Taliban, which excluded the Afghan government, were the next crushing blow, according to the former finance minister. He said the Biden administration’s decision to continue freezing billions of Afghan central bank assets has made things even worse, sending the country’s economy and its unit of currency, the afghani, into a catastrophic plunge.

“It’s outrageous,” he said.

“This is the single biggest blow you can deliver to the Afghan economy. The afghani would be a worthless, dirty old piece of paper if you don’t have the assets to back it up.”

Dhaka to ban ‘immoral character’ test in rape cases

President Joe Biden has nominated Indian American Puneet Talwar as Ambassador of Morocco as part of some key nominations for his administration. Talwar will have to be confirmed by the Senate. Talwar has held senior national security and foreign policy positions in the State Department, White House, and the Senate. He is currently a Senior Advisor at the State Department. Previously, he has served as the Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director at the National Security Council, and as a Senior Professional Staff Member at the Committee on Foreign Relations in the United States Senate.

INDIAN-ORIGIN AUTHOR SHORTLISTED FOR KIDS’ BOOK AWARD Indian-origin author Manjeet Mann has been shortlisted for her children’s book ‘The Crossing’, a tale of a little girl’s friendship with an Eritrean refugee, for the UK’s prestigious Yoto Carnegie Medal. Mann, a UK-based author, has been previously shortlisted for the prize for her debut children’s novel ‘Run, Rebel’. ‘The Crossing’ is her second novel and recently won the 2022 Costa Children’s Book Award. The judges described Mann's novel as a “poignant story of shared humanity, with the stories of two teenagers – one a refugee and the other grief-stricken – cleverly entwined”.

There are seven other authors on the shortlist.

The winner will be announced on June 16.

TEMPLE ATTACKED BY MOB IN DHAKA An Iskcon-affiliated Radhakanta Jeev temple in the Wari area of Dhaka, Bangladesh was attacked on March 17, sources said. Sources said around 150-200 people were involved in the violence at the Iskon temple, in which three Iskcon members were injured. Some damage was caused to the property. According to sources, the High Commission of India is in touch with Bangladeshi authorities. The cause of the trouble, according to authorities, is a longstanding dispute over the land on which the Iskcon temple exists.

GERMANY HITS RECORD COVID INFECTION RATE

DHAKA: Bangladesh will ban questions probing the “immoral character” of rape victims in criminal cases, authorities say, after a long campaign by rights groups against humiliating interrogations of traumatised survivors.

Experts say the country’s Evidence Act, a 19th-century relic of the British colonial era, has been routinely used to discredit the testimony of survivors during court cross-examinations and police investigations.

Female activists have spent more than a decade demanding the law be amended and last year a coalition of rights groups petitioned Bangladesh’s top court for its repeal. Demonstrators take part in a candlelight vigil demanding justice for a recent rape victim in Dhaka Justice minister Anisul Huq said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s cabinet has resolved to remove the character evidence provisions from the law. He said the law currently allows those

accused of rape to “ask questions as to the immoral character of the victim” but this would be banned, with parliament expected to formalise the decision by June. “This is another step towards empowerment of women,” he said. Prominent activist Nina Goswami of the local Ain o Salish Kendra rights group hailed the move as a “remarkable achievement”.

She said character evidence had hindered justice for decades, with many survivors deciding not to seek charges against their attackers out of fear of social humiliation. Last year, the Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST) said character evidence had been used to cast doubt on victim testimony, making it difficult to secure guilty verdicts. Rights groups have said the number of rapes has increased alarmingly in recent years, blaming legal loopholes and a culture of impunity for violence against women.

Germany has recorded its highest rate of Covid19 infections since the start of the pandemic, as mask-wearing mandates in shops, restaurants and schools will come to an end in many parts of the country. The country’s disease control agency reported a record incidence rate of 1,607 new infections per 100,000 people over the past seven days, one of the highest in Europe.

Germany’s Robert Koch Institute has recorded a total of 262,593 confirmed new cases and 269 new deaths in the same period. Experts say the true number of cases could be even higher as testing facilities have reached full capacity and those who test positive with a lateral flow test are no longer required to carry out a PCR test that would show up in the statistics.

KENYA TO RECEIVE $750 MN AID FROM WORLD BANK The World Bank has approved a $750 million loan for Kenya, aimed at supporting the East African country's 2022 budget. Kenya would have to carry out some necessary reforms in its public procurement procedures, aimed at curtailing corruption as a condition to for the approval of the money. The world bank recommends that Kenya establishes an electronic platform for public procurements. The goal for this is to encourage transparency, thus limiting corruption.

The $750 million loan that has been approved is the second tranche of a credit facility that was launched for Kenya in 2020, after the East African country qualified for the World Bank's Development Policy Operations (DPO).

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

21

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

in brief POLITICIANS SEEK NOBEL PRIZE FOR PREZ ZELENSKYY Several current and former European politicians addressed the Norwegian Nobel Committee with a request to nominate Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022, and for this reason extend the nomination procedure until March 31. “We therefore humbly call upon you, the Committee, to consider: Extending and thereby re-opening the nomination procedure for the Nobel Peace Prize until March 31, 2022 to allow for a Nobel Peace Prize nomination for President Zelensky and the people of Ukraine,” the statement said. The politicians also called on the committee “to re-open and reconsider the 2022 nomination procedure for the Nobel Peace Prize,” according to the statement.

132 FEARED DEAD IN CHINA PLANE CRASH A Chinese passenger aircraft with 132 people on board crashed in a mountainous area of southern China on Monday, likely killing all passengers and crew. The China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737 flying from Kunming in southwest China to southern China’s Guangzhou city descended in freefall before crashing in the Guangxi autonomous region, igniting a forest fire, state media reports said.

It is feared that there were no survivors among the 123 passengers and nine-member crew. China Eastern, one of China’s three major carriers, said the cause of the crash, just before which the aircraft descended at a final rate of 31,000 feet a minute according to flight tracking website FlightRadar24, was under investigation.

MYSTERIOUS 'FURRY GREEN SNAKE' FOUND IN THAILAND A creature that can best be described as a furry green snake was found in a swamp in Thailand, baffling locals who had never seen such an animal before. The furry snake was found in the Sakhon Nakhon province of Northeast Thailand by a local man. The man spotted the creature while walking home carried it back in a jar to show it to his family members. The family kept two-feet-long snake in a container filled with water and fed it small fish while they waited for authorities to identify it. Sam Chatfield, who is snake species coordinator at Wildlife ARC agreed that the creature could be a puff-faced water snake with algae growing on its scales.

N KOREAN MISSILE EXPLODED IN AIR A North Korean missile fired from its capital region exploded soon after liftoff in an apparent failed launch, South Korea's military said, amid speculation that the North is preparing to launch its longest-range weapon in the most significant provocation in years. Details of the missile explosion and the possibility of civilian damage weren't immediately known. But the launch, the 10th of its kind this year, shows North Korea is determined to press ahead on its push to modernize its arsenal and pressure rivals into making concessions while denuclearization talks are frozen. The missile blew up as it was flying at an altitude of less than 20 km, a South Korean military official said.

FINLAND CROWNED WORLD’S HAPPIEST NATION Finland has been named the world’s happiest country for the fifth year running, in an annual UN-sponsored index that ranked Afghanistan as the unhappiest, closely followed by Lebanon.

The latest list was completed before the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Bulgaria, Romania and Serbia recorded the biggest boosts in wellbeing.

The largest falls in the World Happiness table came in Lebanon, Venezuela and Afghanistan.

Lebanon, which is facing economic meltdown, fell to second from last on the index of 146 countries, just below Zimbabwe.

Asian woman kicked, punched over 125 times by racist thug in NY New York: A 67-year-old woman in New York was punched over 125 times in the head and face, stomped on seven times and called an ‘Asian b*tch’ by a man who attacked her outside her apartment building, according to police.

The victim, who has not yet publicly been identified, was attacked while trying to enter her apartment building in Yonkers, New York.

Surveillance video shows the attacker, identified by police as 42-year-old Tammel Esco, hit the woman from behind and knocking her off her feet.

Moments before the attack, Esco reportedly called the woman an ‘Asian b*tch’ as she walked past him, according to Yonkers Police. After she ignored him, Esco followed her into the entryway of the apartment building where he punched her in the head and face more than 125 times. He then stomped on her upper body about seven times and spit on her, according to the Westchester County District Attorney’s Office.

The frenzied attack left the woman to be treated for serious injuries at a local hospital.

Since the start of the coron-

avirus pandemic, thousands of people in the US have been victims of anti-Asian assaults, ranging from verbal abuse to physical attacks.

Yonkers Police Commissioner John J Mueller called the attack ‘one of the most appalling’ incidents he’s ever seen. ‘To beat a helpless woman is despicable and targeting her because of her race makes it more so,’ Mueller said in a statement Monday.

‘This defendant must be held to the maximum punishment allowed by law to send a clear message that hateful, violent behavior will not be toler-

ated in our communities. Our thoughts and prayers are with the victim and her family, that she may make a full recovery.’

The woman is currently in hospital after suffering numerous contusions and lacerations, facial fractures and brain bleeding.

Esco was arrested outside of the building. He has been charged with two felonies — attempted murder and assault in the second degree involving a victim who is 65 or older.

Each count has been charged as a hate crime. He is scheduled to appear in court next on March 25.

Biden mistakenly refers to Kamala Harris as 'First Lady' WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden recently referred to vice president Kamala Harris as the “First Lady" at event arranged by the White House.

The gaffe occurred when Biden was informing his audience at the ‘Equal Pay Day’ event that Harris was not present with him because her husband, Doug Emhoff, had tested positive for Covid.

“There’s been a little change in arrangement of who is on the stage because of the First Lady’s husband contracting Covid," Biden says in a video that has gone viral on social media.

Someone next to him appears to

correct him, drawing laughter from the audience. He then corrects himself to clarify that he meant Kamal Harris and although she is fine, the "First Gentleman" had contracted the virus.

That was his second, but not the last, gaffe as Emhoff's is the Second Gentleman. As per a Townhall report, the US President also incorrectly referred to Linda ThomasGreenfield, his UN ambassador, as “Linda Thomas-Greenhouse."

Joe Biden has often come under fire on social media for his gaffes.

Recently, he referred to

Ukrainians as “Iranians" in his State of the Union speech. He was appealing to people to put up a united front against Russian aggression and stand in support of Ukraine. His gaffe, however, soon went viral on social media platforms.

“Putin may circle Kyiv with tanks, but he’ll never gain the hearts and souls of the Iranian people," Biden can be heard saying in a viral clip of the incident. Vice President Kamala Harris can be seen standing next

Joe Biden to him. Some Twitter users have claimed that Harris seems to mouth “Ukrainian" just as Biden makes the mistake in his speech.

Indian-origin billionaire takes British firm to court SINGAPORE: A Singapore-based Indian billionaire has dragged a British intelligence and cyber security company to the high court in London in a case which features a UK country house - once the marital home of Prince Andrew, a Kazakh tycoon, Morgan Stanley - and allegations of money laundering.

Arvind Tiku, founder and chairman of AT Capital group, a private investment company headquartered in Singapore, has filed a lawsuit seeking compensation and a declaration from S-RM Intelligence and Risk

Consulting Limited that the personal data held by them about him is inaccurate.

S-RM provides insights to clients on individuals which includes due diligence, and background checks to help them “navigate complex risks”. From November 2014 till February 2020, S-RM is alleged to have made four reports on Tiku and disclosed it to third parties.

In February 2021, Tiku made a data subject access report seeking a full copy of the personal data in those reports. In the UK, individuals have the right to access and

receive copies of their personal data and other information held by companies to see how and for what purpose it is being used. In March 2021, S-RM provided a redacted copy of the Morgan Stanley report to Tiku, and declined to identify the entities who had commissioned additional reports, saying that they were outside the territorial scope of the UK/EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This also possibly means that the data contained in these reports were effectively transferred outside the UK and European Union.

Revival of Indian culture and Hindu dharma in Kenya, Uganda Nitin Mehta One of the strange things that happened after Idi Amin deported Asians from Uganda and when thousands of Indians left Kenya in search of a better life in the UK the void that was created was filled by Indians from India! On my recent visit to Kenya I saw this first hand at the Kisumu Laxmi Narayan temple. It was celebrating its 85th year and the temple was packed with devotees. The overwhelming number of people there were recent arrivals from India. When I say recent I mean in the last 25 years. Most of them are Gujarati's but there is also an increasing number of IT specialists as well engineers and doctors from North and South India.

The amalgamation of the new and old Indians has created a special new vibrancy in the diaspora. Hindu festivals are celebrated with great enthusiasm. Temples are promoting Indian culture and running countless charity projects. Food distribution, education, and medical care all are provided by the Indian community on a massive level. In the Parklanes area of Nairobi a Jalaram Medical Centre has opened and it treats patients on a very nominal charge. The Jalaram temple also serves lunch to several schools everyday. The Sikh and Jain communities also do a huge amount of charity

work.

There is another significant change and that is there is almost complete harmony between African Kenyans and Indian Kenyans. The prejudices of the past have more or less disappeared. A big amount of the economy is still controlled by the Indian community and it provides tens of thousands of jobs to Kenyans. From small shopkeepers the Indian community have become big industrialists and the millennial generation is diversifying into high tech industries.

Unique amongst the Hindu movements in Kenya is the Hare Krishna Society which actively preaches to the Kenyans and if you went to the morning worship at the temple in Nairobi you would see the whole temple filled with Africans singing Sanskrit prayers.

Increasing number of Africans are also becoming Vegetarians and Vegans. In

Nairobi I met Racheal, a Kikuyu lady who is the founder of the Vegan Society of Kenya. She wants to start a Cow Sanctuary on the outskirts of Nairobi. She has been to India and has a Guru! In Uganda too the Indian community is doing very well and the Ugandans are the friendliest people. The Mehta and Madhvani families still control thousands of acres of sugar cane farms.

During my visit to Uganda I went to Jinja, a city on the shores of Lake Victoria. It is known as the place where the source of river Nile begins. Englishman Speke who is credited with finding the source of the Nile admitted that he had gained the information from a Hindu monk in India. According to the Puranas, the real source of the Nile is known as Som Giri. Som meaning Moon and Giri meaning Mountains. This is proof that Indians had known of this part of the world tens of thousands of years ago! So our connection with East Africa is not just 150 to 200 years! The future is bright for Kenya and Uganda and together in the spirit of Harambe the nations will progress.

22

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Azad meets Sonia, G-23 seeks greater say in Cong Leader of the Congress dissident group G-23 Ghulam Nabi Azad met party chief Sonia Gandhi at her residence last week, capping days of escalated activities by the bloc, which has reiterated its demands for party reforms and “inclusive and collective leadership”.

After the meeting, Azad told reporters that the talks revolved around suggestions to strengthen the party and the strategy to fight the coming assembly polls and establishing unitedly, partnership with like-minded regional parties.

After the Congress decimation in the recently held assembly elections to five states, Azad said that “leaders like him cannot

Sonia Gandhi & Ghulam Nabi Azad

watch the Congress die… the situation is alarming”. The bloc of 23 leaders, who in 2020 wrote a letter to Sonia seeking sweeping reforms in the party structure, have held multiple meetings in recent days to press their demands, even issuing a joint statement this

15-20 Indians still in Ukraine who want to be evacuated: govt At least 15-20 Indians are in conflict-hit Ukraine and they are waiting to be evacuated, the government said. It assured that evacuation flights under Operation Ganga "are not over".

"We are providing all Arindam Bagchi possible assistance to these people. Some people are still in Kherson. Operation Ganga is not over and we are helping all those who wish to be evacuated," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said. Kherson is in southern Ukraine.

When tensions in Ukraine increased, the Indian embassy there started a registration drive for Indians in January, and some 20,000 Indians - mostly students - had registered. Foreign Minister S Jaishankar said more than half of the students were in universities in eastern Ukraine that borders Russia. This area has been the epicentre of the conflict so far.

He said despite the government efforts, a large majority of students decided to stay put in Ukraine. "Despite our efforts, however, a large majority of students continued staying in Ukraine. We must understand their predicament in this regard.

There was a natural reluctance to leave educational institutions, which would affect their studies. Some universities actively discouraged and showed reluctance to offer online courses," the minister said in a statement to parliament on the situation in Ukraine.

The government has so far evacuated thousands of Indians from Ukraine's cities - Kyiv, Kharkiv and others. Russia and Ukraine had given a humanitarian corridor for their exit following India's intense diplomatic engagement with the two sides. Ukraine leader said Russia was building a new Cold War wall across Europe "between freedom and bondage", after his government accused invading forces of bombing a theatre sheltering many civilians and marked with the word "children".

week. Sensing the vulnerability and the need to forge a united face ahead of the elections in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh, the party chief also reached out to the dissidents this week, calling Azad before the meeting of the

G-23 leaders.

After the talks with Sonia, Azad said, “Mrs Gandhi keeps having discussions with leaders to strengthen the organization. A few days ago, the Congress Working Committee had met and suggestions were sought as to how

to strengthen the Congress party and what were the reasons for the defeat [in five assembly polls]. I had also given my suggestions.”

After maximalist demands from dissidents, like Kapil Sibal who called for the Gandhi family to step away from the party leadership, Azad’s visit to 10 Janpath indicates that the bloc may not push for an extreme position and is ready to accept the olive branch extended by the leadership.

However, sources said the G23 demand for creation of a Central Parliamentary Board is still on the wish list. The loyalists have so far been averse to the suggestion. Though Azad rebuffed

queries about G-23 seeking a change in leadership, asking “where is the vacancy”, it remains to be seen how the issue pans out in the run-up to the organisational polls scheduled for September.

Some members of the dissident bloc are keen that the leadership be divided - like the Gandhi family taking the leadership of Parliament, while the party reins go to a senior leader outside the family, or vice versa.

Earlier, former chief minister of Haryana Bhupinder Singh Hooda, met Rahul Gandhi, in what was seen as a preliminary contact for reconciliation between the dissidents and the establishment.

China proposes visits, events to revive India talks Two years into the military standoff along the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh, Beijing has reached out to New Delhi to revive bilateral dialogue and set the stage for the BRICS (Brazil-Russia-IndiaChina-South Africa) summit in China later this year. Beijing has proposed a series of events to kickstart the dialogue, starting with possible high-level visits from both sides.

To begin with, Beijing has proposed a visit by Chinese State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi to India as early as this month. This is to be followed by a

reciprocal visit by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. The Chinese side has also proposed a series of high-level visits by its top Politburo members and key officials in President Xi Jinping’s regime.

The Chinese have also proposed an ‘India-China Civilization Dialogue’ to be held in both countries. They have also proposed an India-China Trade and Investment Cooperation Forum and an India-China Film Forum.

But China’s ultimate and clear objective is to host Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the in-person BRICS summit which will be

attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin as well. China, which also holds the chair for the RIC (Russia-India-China) trilateral this year, could also host the leaders’ summit on the sidelines of the BRICS summit.

In the current circumstances, it is politically difficult for Modi to attend an in-person meeting with Xi - when the border standoff has still not been resolved. Their last face-to-face meeting was in Brazil for the BRICS summit in November 2019. In October 2019, Xi had visited India for an informal summit in Mahabalipuram.

Hira Ratan Manek who lived on water and sunlight no more Hira Ratan Manek, the researcher of the method of solar healing who set a record for spending 411 days without solid food, passed away at the age of 85 in Kozhikode, Kerala, on March 13.

He was remembered by city-based physicians who had carried out a number of tests on him.

“Manek had founded the ‘Hira Ratan Manek Phenomenon’ that propagated the idea of sun gazing for health without the intake of food. He had earned a spot in the Guinness Book of Records for not eating anything for 411 days straight in 2001.

I had led a team of 24 doctors and physicians to monitor this feat,” said city-based neuro physician Sudhir

Shah.

Shah said that the team carried out a number of tests and the results showed him to be a person of normal health. Shah said that there are three documentary films made on Manek’s feat. Manek had given up solid food for almost two decades. Manek travelled to more than 100 countries including the US to deliver lectures.

Apart from numerous research articles, Manek also authored a book named ‘Sungazing’. He held seminars and classes for various universities and was a member of the ‘Solar Energy Society of India’. Manek had a degree in mechanical engineering. He was working as a trader of perfumes

Hira Ratan Manek

in Kozhikode. His ancestors came from Sujapur in Kutch and settled in Kozhikode for business. He has also held positions in the Jain society in Kozhikode. Manek’s wife Vimala Hirachand passed away a month ago.

He is survived by a son and a daughter.

Meet the Tree-man of Gujarat Nischal Sanghavi Gujarat based Vijay Dobariya is on a mission to make his state green. He has already planted 1.5 million trees and ensured that they grow properly by nurturing them with a fleet of 600 full-time personnel.

Doing philanthropy at a personal level is one thing. But, here is a simple man who has built a huge corporate-like management where a staff of 600 works full-time towards the “Green Mission.” Businessman Dobariya, 38, hails from a small hamlet in Gujarat. In 2014 he felt like doing something to give back to society. Zeroing down on the idea of planting trees, he chose his small-time native village Fatehpur, for the activity. After planting 1,000 trees around the village, he started taking care of these plants and also deployed a water tanker to water them. On getting immense satisfaction from the activity he extended it to five nearby villages and later to the entire sub-region.

Engaged in the business of agriculture medicines, Dobariya spent a few million

rupees from his own funds towards his treeplantation activity. After that Dobariya started getting tremendous support from people.

As per Dobariya, “only planting the trees is not enough, according to our research each plant needs to be nurtured for the first four years like a child. Post 4-year period the trees are strong enough to survive on their own. After 7 years of starting the activity, today we have 1.5 million trees planted so far, with 250,000 of them in the last 12 months. The important thing is that we are 100% sure that each and every plant is standing at its place right now and is being

taken proper care of.”

Dobariya under the banner of Sadbhavna Trust employs 600 people only to plant and nurture the trees. The trust has its own JCBs, mini-trucks, 120 tractors with water tankers engaged in the activity. The trees are watered regularly for the first four years. Each tree is given a metal tree guard and a green-net. The net of each tree is changed every 12 months. All plants are supplied with fertilizer once a month. Not only that, the staff keeps a complete check of each and every plant. If one plant dries or is destroyed due to some reason a team from Sadbhavna Trust will go there immediately

and plant a new one at that place. With a monthly expense of Rs 15 million (GBP 150,000), Dobariya has seen over a spending of Rs 700 million (GBP 7 million) so far for planting and nurturing of trees. While donors are coming forward to donate, Dobariya has also donated millions of rupees from his own funds.

The places where trees are planted include 300,000 on road-sides and roaddividers in Rajkot city in addition to few other cities and towns. Trees have been planted on dividers of over 300 km of motorway connecting major cities. These trees are also regularly nurtured. In a campaign where they planted a tree per house, Dobariya has been instrumental in planting trees in 71,000 courtyards of houses in Rajkot and Jamnagar.

The state government has recently recognised the efforts of Dobariya and awarded him with ‘Vana Pandit’ award, for exceptional contribution in the field of protection of environment and related activities on a long term basis.

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

www.asian-voice.com

23 26 March - 1 April 2022

in brief HOOCH KILLS 18 HOLI REVELLERS IN BIHAR At least 18 people died and several others fell ill in three districts of Bihar, a dry state, after consuming spurious liquor on Holi. Nine people died in different villages under Amarpur block in Banka, six in Bhagalpur and three in Madhepura districts since Friday. The cause of the deaths will be clear following autopsy results. Most of the victims complained of shortness of breath, body ache, vomiting and loss of vision, doctors said. Many people are being treated in hospitals.

Banka DM Suharsh Bhagat and SP Arvind Kumar Gupta have ordered a probe. Dr Asim Kumar Das, superintendent of Mayaganj Hospital, said two patients died on Friday and five on Sunday, including three from Bhagalpur.

SECURITY FOR ‘THE KASHMIR FILES’ DIRECTOR Film director Vivek Agnihotri, who has kicked up a political storm with his movie ‘The Kashmir Files’ based on the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from the Valley due to terrorism, has been given ‘Y’ category security with CRPF commando cover. The decision to provide Agnihotri with the fourth highest category security in the country has been taken by the Ministry of Home Affairs, the sources said. This move came weeks after Agnihotri claimed a threat to his life over the release of his film.

The film is being actively pushed by several BJP-ruled states. The opposition has, however, termed the film one-sided and too violent.

DALAI LAMA APPEARS IN PUBLIC AFTER 2 YEARS Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama made his first public appearance in Dharamshala in about two years since the Covid pandemic hit the country. The 14th Dalai Lama delivered teachings from the Jataka Tales followed by the ceremony for generating Bodhichitta (semkye) at the main Tibetan temple, Tsuglakhang.

Thousands of Tibetans, including monks, nuns, MPs, Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) president and his Cabinet ministers in-exile, had gathered for the spiritual discourse. Addressing the gathering, he said that he was scheduled to go to Delhi for a regular health check-up but did not do so as he was in good health.

PRINCIPAL BOOKED FOR THRASHING STUDENT A Class X student alleged that he was beaten with a stick by the principal, who accused him of breaking the wash basin in the washroom.

The boy, studying in Omkar School on Kothariya Road, Rajkot, told police that principal Rajnish Gadhiya first switched off CCTVs of his chamber and thrashed him. He suffered injuries on legs, hands, chest and back.

He had gone to use the washroom during recess and noticed that the broken basin.

Police said a farewell party of Class X students was organized at the school. Some students fought in the washroom which resulted in the basin breaking. However, someone complained to his teacher that the boy had broken it, said inspector V J Chavda of Aji dam police station

BJP MLC DENIED RELIEF IN CHEATING CASE Pravin Darekar, the opposition leader in the Maharashtra Legislative Council, petitioned the Bombay high court to quash an FIR filed against him on March 14 at MRA Marg police station in Mumbai, but got no interim protection against coercive action. The FIR accuses Darekar of forging documents to become a member of the Pratigya Labour Cooperative Society in order to contest for a post in a cooperative bank in a category reserved for the working class. Darekar’s contention is that the criminal prosecution has been initiated “under the influence of the state government to stop him from making allegations regarding corruption” in the running of the state. The HC posted his petition for hearing after two weeks without granting him any immediate relief.

Japan to invest $42 bn in India; PMs of both countries discuss Ukraine crisis Ukraine and China were among the issues that dominated the agenda for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s first summit meeting with his Japanese counterpart, Fumio Kishida, even as the two countries announced investments worth close to $42 billion by Fumio Kishida & Narendra Modi Japan in India over a period of five years, surpassing the $33 billion announced by Tokyo in 2014.

While Modi didn’t mention Ukraine in his press statement, Kishida said he had told his Indian counterpart any attempt to unilaterally change the status quo anywhere should never be tolerated.

An India-Japan joint statement issued later also underlined the significance of international law and the need to resolve disputes without any use of force or any attempt to unilaterally change the status quo, even though it didn’t directly name Russia.

As expected, Kishida brought up Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in his meeting with Modi and sought a common stand on the issue.

In a press statement, he said Russia’s invasion is a serious issue that has shaken the international order and that there is a need for a peaceful situation on the basis of international law. “Japan, a long with India, will keep trying to end the war and keep providing support to Ukraine and its neighbouring countries,” said Kishida.

Foreign secretary Harsh Shringla said later that the “important” issue figured in the meeting and that Modi and Kishida sought immediate cessation of violence along with dialogue and diplomacy to resolve the crisis. The joint statement said Modi and Kishida expressed their serious concern about the ongoing conflict and humanitarian crisis in Ukraine and assessed its broader implications, particularly for the Indo-Pacific region.

PM Modi, Shah to attend Yogi’s swearing-in on March 25 Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union home minister Amit Shah, other senior cabinet colleagues, CMs of states where BJP is in office and prominent politicians will be present at Ekana Stadium in Lucknow on March 25 when Yogi Adityanath takes oath as UP CM for a second term along with his ministers after a historic repeat mandate in the recent state elections.

BJP has decided to invite senior opposition leaders, including Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, BSP chief Mayawati and others.Yogi will be the first CM after 1952 to register a win after completing a full five-year term. Top party sources said the focus will be on giving representation to women and young MLAs, other than the caste and regional factors.

Biren takes oath as Manipur CM again A day after he was elected BJP legislature wing leader, Nongthombam Biren Singh was sworn in as Manipur’s chief minister for a second term on Monday afternoon. Five MLAs Thongam Biswajit Singh, Yumnam Khemchand Singh, Govindas Konthoujam and Nemcha Kipgen of the saffron party, and Manipur NPF president Awangbow Newmai were also sworn in.

BJP retains Dhami as Uttarakhand CM Ending 11 days of suspense, BJP on Monday decided to continue with Puskhar Singh Dhami as Uttarakhand chief minister. He is likely to take oath on Wednesday. Dhami’s name was announced at the BJP legislative party meeting in the presence of defence minister Rajnath Singh and Union MoS Meenakshi Lekhi, the party’s observer and co-observer for Uttarakhand. Singh told reporters Dhami was elected leader of the legislative party with the consensus of all the MLAs. “I’m confident he will ensure Uttarakhand makes rapid progress in future. ” Sawant invited to form govt in Goa Pramod Sawant was on Monday unanimously elected the leader of the BJP legislature party in Goa, paving the way for him to take over as the CM for a second term, and soon after the ruling party staked claim to form the new government with support from two MGP MLAs and three Independent legislators.

Yogi Adityanath

Asian Voice wishes its readers, supporters, advertisers and those celebrating a Happy Nowroz.

India defends Russian oil deal, hits out at West Citing India’s energy needs, the government continues to strongly defend its deal with Russia for the purchase of 3 million barrels of crude at a discounted price. With disquiet running deep in the US and prominent European capitals over India’s decision, official sources said, “Countries with oil self-sufficiency or those importing themselves from Russia cannot credibly advocate restrictive trading”.

The apparent dig at the US follows remarks by the White House cautioning India against placing itself on the wrong side of history by buying Russian crude. While India doesn’t violate US sanctions with its Russian oil deal, the purchase is still seen as a setback for the US in its efforts to, as a senior US official said recently, close the gap with India on the Ukraine issue.

The development also comes ahead of the India-US 2+2 dialogue which, after several false starts, is finally expected to take place in the second week of April. While the US is trying to convince India that the Russian action in Ukraine will embolden China to act more aggressively in the neighbourhood, official sources said geopolitical developments have posed significant challenges to India’s energy security and that “for obvious reasons”, India has had to stop sourcing from Iran and Venezuela despite alternative sources costing a lot more.

“Notably, recent Western sanctions on Russia have carve-outs to avoid impact on energy imports from Russia,” said a source, adding that Russian banks acting as main channels for European Union payments for Russian energy imports have not been excluded from SWIFT payment system. “Russian oil or gas is being procured by various countries across the world, particularly Europe. Seventy five per cent of Russia’s total natural gas exports is to OECD Europe. European countries are also large importers of Russian crude oil,” said the source.

“India has to keep focusing on competitive energy sources. We welcome such offers from all producers. Indian traders, too, operate in global energy markets to explore best options,” he added.

Danbhaskar Award presented to NRI donor Virendrabhai Patel

Trustee of Shri Charotar Moti Sattavis Patidar Kelavani Mandal, Vice president of Charusat Healthcare and Research Foundation, Founder of Charusat Educational Foundation USA and NRI donor Shri Virendrabhai Patel was honored with the Danbhaskar award on 19th March 2022 at Charusat Campus Changa.

Virendrabhai Patel, fondly known as Victor, is settled in USA for about 50 years. In the year 2005, in order to serve the society, he choose to entrust business responsibilities to his sons and dedicated his life for the community services. In the year 2009, he was invited by the Kelavani Mandal to act as a Trustee. His availability, valuable suggestions and guidance for the development of the organisations has been big. In 2012, he established Charusat Educational Foundation, Inc. (CEF) in the USA with the objective of spreading awareness about the Charust conglomerate and raising funds. He extended his helping hand, further taking one more responsibility of serving as the Vice President of CHRF in the year 2015.

His commitment helped not only in improving hospital services but also in sourcing funds to improve medical facilities. He has been promoting all these organisations by making available latest technological interventions of the website and other social media platforms. As desired by his wife Smt. Sangeetaben, he has contributed Rs 10.44 million to the Charusat Hospital fund in the memory of their beloved son Vivek. His contribution to the education and healthcare sector is highly venerated by Shri Charotar Moti Sattavis Patidar Kelavani Mandal.

24

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

SOUTH INDIA

in brief

Karnataka gives Body of Karnataka student killed in Ukraine handed security to judges who ruled on hijab over to family BENGALURU: The body of Naveen Shekarappa Gyanagoudar, 21, an Indian medical student who died in Ukraine on March 1, arrived in Bengaluru on Monday morning and was taken to his home town in Haveri town of Karnataka.

Gyanagoudar, a fourth-year medical student at Kharkiv National Medical University, was killed when he stepped out of his apartment to buy groceries. He was the first Indian casualty in the Ukraine war.

His last rites will be done according to the VeerashaivaLingayat community’s tradition, Gyanagoudar’s family said. The body will then be donated to SS Medical College for research. “We will perform the rituals as per our tradition and then will donate his

body,” said Shekarappa, Gyanagoudar’s father.

“Since childhood, he wanted to become a doctor and serve society.

However, he did not get a seat in a government medical college in India, so he went to Ukraine to pursue his medical education.

His dream of becoming a doctor did not come true, so we decided to donate his body so that the future generation could do their research and be beneficial for them,” his father said. It was a Herculean task to bring the body back from the war-torn country, said Karnataka chief minister Basavaraj Bommai, who received the body at Bengaluru airport. “It is unfortunate that so many people returned (from Ukraine) but Naveen lost his life in the bombing,” Bommai said.

BENGALURU: The Karnataka government has decided to beef up security for the high court judges who were part of the special bench that ruled against the plea for allowing Muslim girl students to wear hijab in school and college classrooms.

Karnataka government’s decision comes in the wake of death threats to the judges from certain quarters in neighbouring Tamil Nadu. Chief minister Basavaraj Bommai said that the high court judges who gave the verdict on the Hijab issue, will be provided with Y-category security.

Speaking to the media, Bommai said, “If anybody is not happy with the verdict he or she has the option of approaching the higher courts. We will not tolerate antinational forces that threaten the rule of law in the country.

Already security has been strengthened for the judges but I have instructed that they be provided with Y-category security.” Bommai also questioned the silence of so-called liberals and secularists, on the threats being issued to the judges. The state police have been instructed to seek custody of the accused and bring them to Karnataka for further investigation. Two persons have been taken into custody in Tamil Nadu in connection with issuing death threats to the judges of Karnataka high court who dismissed petitions demanding wearing of hijab in classrooms.

PUNJAB

Bhajji and Chadha among 5 AAP candidates for RS poll CHANDIGARH: The Aam Aadmi Party has nominated former cricketer Harbhajan Singh, Lovely Professional University founder Ashok Mittal, AAP MLA Raghav Chadha, IIT Delhi faculty Sandeep Pathak and industrialist Sanjeev Arora for the March 31 Rajya Sabha polls.

All five party candidates filed their nomination papers at the Punjab Vidhan Sabha complex on Monday. On being elected, 33year-old Raghav Chadha will be the youngest Rajya Sabha member. Currently, the youngest member is Olympics bronze medallist boxer Mary Kom (39).

No other political party nominated any candidate for the polls, said officials. The term of five Rajya Sabha members from Punjab - Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa (SAD), Naresh Gujral (SAD), Partap Singh Bajwa (Congress), Shamsher Singh Dullo (Congress) and Shwait Malik (BJP) will expire on April 9.

Meanwhile, the opposition parties slammed AAP over the choice of candidates, accusing it of cheating people by fielding outsiders. Former cricketer Harbhajan Singh said his focus will be on promoting sports and improving sports-related infrastructure. Harbhajan Singh was a former spinner of the Indian cricket team. Hailing from Jalandhar, Singh also captained Mumbai Indians and Kings Xl Pun- jab in the IPL.

Zail Singh’s kin is new Punjab speaker; home dept with Mann CHANDIGARH: Two-time Aam Aadmi Party MLA Kultar Singh Sandhwan was on Monday unanimously elected as Speaker of the 16th Punjab Vidhan Sabha.

Sandhwan, 46, won from the Kotkapura seat in the recent state polls. He defeated Congress candidate Ajaipal Singh Sandhu by a margin of 21,130 votes.

Sandhwan is the grandnephew of former president Giani Zail Singh and will succeed former Speaker Rana K P Singh.

In his maiden speech on the floor of the House, Mann congratulated Sandhwan on his election and assured members that all efforts will be made to ensure that the assembly proceedings are live-streamed.

Portfolios allocated: CM Bhagwant Singh Mann allocated portfolios to the 10 members of his newly-constituted council of

ministers, retaining the home department for himself and appointing senior AAP politician Harpal Singh Cheema as the state’s new finance minister.

Cheema is a second-time MLA from Dirba and was Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the last House. The only other secondtime MLA in the Cabinet, Gurmit Singh Meet Hayer, is the new education minister, and first-time MLA Dr Vijay Singla, a dentist, has been assigned the health department. Singla defeated Punjabi singer Sidhu Moosewala in Mansa. The only woman in the cabinet, Dr Baljit Kaur, is the minister for women’s welfare and child development, first-time MLA from Bhoa Lal Chand Kataruchak has got food and civil supplies and Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal is the new rural department and panchayat minister.

WEST BENGAL

Mamata kin move SC, challenges ED decision NEW DELHI: Hours before being questioned in a money laundering case linked to a coal mining scam in West Bengal, Trinamool Congress leader Abhishek Banerjee and his wife Rujira moved the Supreme Court challenging the Enforcement Directorate’s decision to interrogate them in Delhi in breach of Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) safeguards.

Though senior advocate A M Singhvi was ready to mention the Banerjees’ petition for urgent hearing and request for interim relief, it could not materialise as CJI N VRamana cancelled the mentioning process because of some administrative exigencies. They have challenged the Delhi High

Court order of March 13 which validated the ED’s decision to summon them to Delhi for interrogation.

The Banerjees said the summons were issued by the ED under Section 50 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) under the wrong understanding that the Act was a complete code, working de hors the CrPC. The petition jointly filed by the husband-wife duo quoted Section 160 of the CrPC, which they said provided two important safeguards - (i) attendance of a witness can be sought only in the local police station, and (ii) in case of a woman, the attendance shall only be at her place of residence.

“The ED didn’t even attempt

to interrogate the petitioners at Kolkata. It is still unclear as to what are the impediments that the ED will face if it interrogates the petitioners at their full-fledged office in Kolkata, rather than a bald assertion of powers under Section 50 to investigate in New Delhi,” they said.

They also questioned the assumption of pan-India jurisdiction made by the ED, irrespective of the place of occurrence of the alleged offence. “Being a pan-India agency means that the ED has

Mamata Banerjee

the jurisdiction to initiate proceedings at any place in India. But such pan-India status does not and cannot mean that the principles of territoriality and local cause of action can be obliterated. It cannot mean that the ED can suo motu vest jurisdiction to a place that otherwise lacks jurisdiction.”

TN PASSES RESOLUTION AGAINST MEKEDATU DAM The Tamil Nadu Assembly adopted a unanimous resolution condemning Karnataka government for its 'unilateral' decision to proceed with the Mekedatu dam project across the Cauvery river and prevailed upon the Centre to reject the proposal. Water resources Minister Duraimurugan who piloted the resolution accused the neighbouring state of posing problems to Tamil Nadu for decades and said Karnataka's decision to proceed with the dam (balancing reservoir) project "disrespecting' the Supreme court verdict is reprehensible. The resolution condemned Karnataka for going ahead with the project and asked the Centre not to entertain that state's plea for the project.

231 BOYCOTT EXAM AT KARNATAKA COLLEGE A total of 231 Muslim students at Government PU College in Uppinangady, Karnataka, refused to sit for preparatory exams when the women among them were told they could not appear for the test wearing the hijab. The college cited the recent Karnataka high court order that dismissed the petition of six Muslim women students who wanted to wear the hijab in classrooms. When some Muslim women arrived wearing the hijab, the college did not permit them to sit for the test. This led to tension as nearly 250 students, including men, started a protest, demanding permission for the women to write the exam wearing the hijab.

CLP LEADER'S SELECTION DELAYED

BY A WEEK The selection of the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader has been delayed by at least a week as the party high command has asked Punjab affairs in charge Harish Chaudhary to listen to a cross-section of party leaders, besides the party candidates who have won or lost the elections. The announcement of the PCC chief to replace Navjot Singh Sidhu is also expected around the same time. Party president Sonia Gandhi has also appointed senior leader Ajay Maken to assess the post-poll situation in Punjab and suggest organisational changes based on the feedback from party contestants and other important leaders. The meetings with Punjab leaders are said to be taking place in Delhi. For the CLP leader, Partap Singh Bajwa and Sukhjinder Randhawa are among the contenders.

8 DIE IN BENGAL AFTER HOUSES SET AFIRE Eight people were burnt to death after their houses were set on fire at Rampurhat in Birbhum district in West Bengal, police said. As per reports, the incident took place within an hour after the alleged murder of a Trinamool Congress panchayat leader on Monday, DGP Manoj Malaviya said.

Malaviya said seven charred bodies were recovered from one of the burnt houses, while one injured person died in hospital.

The situation is now under control and a police picket has been established in the village. We are investigating how the houses caught fire and whether the incident is related to the death of the panchayat leader, he said. Asked about claims by some fire brigade officials that 10 bodies were found, the top police officer clarified while seven of them were recovered after the blaze was brought under control, three injured persons were rescued of whom one died in a hospital.

AsianVoiceNews

25

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

India, Australia express concern over Ukraine conflict Australian PM Scott Morrison expressed understanding of India's position on Ukraine conflict while holding Russia to account for its Ukraine offensive in the virtual summit with PM Modi on Monday, foreign secretary Harsh Shringla said. Even as Modi and Morrison expressed serious concern over the conflict and the humanitarian situation in Ukraine, they agreed the conflict in Europe should not divert the Quad countries’ focus from the Indo-Pacific with the Australian PM underlining the need to ensure what is happening in Ukraine never occurs in the Indo-Pacific.

Modi briefed his counterpart about the situation at LAC and reiterated there cannot be normalisation of ties with China till peace and tranquillity along the border is

restored. Morrison also spoke against Chinese activities in South China Sea. Aus looking to increase its investments in India Foreign secretary said a significant outcome of the summit was to institutionalise an annual bilateral summit mechanism. India had

annual summits only with Russia and Japan till now.

While the two countries signed several agreements including one for co-investment in Australian critical mineral projects, an area where Australia is looking to compete with China. Australia is looking to increase its investments in

PM Modi remains world's most popular leader Prime Minister Narendra Modi remains the world’s most popular leader with an approval rating of 77%, according to a US-based global leader approval tracker – Morning Consult.

Among the list of 13 leaders, Mexico's Andrés Manuel López Obrador was placed second with an approval rating of 63%, followed by Italy's Mario Draghi (54%) and Japan's Fumio Kishida (42% ).

PM Modi had the lowest disapproval ratings among all the leaders at 17%.

The agency currently tracks the approval ratings of government leaders in Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States.

US President Joe Biden had an approval rating of 41% while UK PM Boris Johnson

Narendra Modi

had the lowest approval rating of 33%. French President Emmanuel Macron had a disapproval rating of 52%, South Korean President Moon Jae-in 54%, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison 53% and Canadian PM Justin Trudeau 52%.

The latest approval ratings are based on data collected from March 9-15, 2022. On May 2-3, 2020, PM Modi's approval rating was at an all-time high of 84%.

In the United States, the average sample size is around

45,000. In the other countries, the sample size ranges from roughly 3,000-5,000, according to Morning Consult. It said that all interviews are conducted online among nationally representative samples of adults.

In India, the sample is representative of the literate population. The company said that surveys are weighted in each country by age, gender, region and, in certain countries, education breakdowns based on official government sources.

Holi turns tragic as 11 drown in Gujarat Eleven people, including seven teenagers drowned in separate incidents in Devbhumi Dwarka, Kheda and Mahisagar districts of Gujarat following Dhuleti celebrations, police said. Dhuleti, a festival of colours, is celebrated a day after Holi in the state.

In Devbhumi Dwarka, five boys who entered the water for bathing after celebrating Dhuleti, drowned in the Triveni river after misjudging its depth, police said. They were identified as Jit Luhar (16), Himanshu Rathod (17), Bhupen Bagda (16), Dhaval Chandegara (16) and Hitarth Goswami (16), all local residents. Fire brigade personnel from Bhanvad and Khambhalia towns along with local divers retrieved the bodies, Bhanvad police station's sub- inspector

Nikunj Joshi said.

Two teenagers drowned in a lake near Zarol village in Vaso taluka of Kheda district after celebrating Dhuleti, said a local police official. He identified the deceased as Pritesh Solanki (15) and Sagar Solanki (14), both residents of Zarol village.

In neighbouring Mahisagar district, four unidentified youngsters lost their lives after drowning in the Mahisagar river near Wanakbori dam. “After attending a fair near the dam, these youngsters, who had come in a car, got into the river to bathe. After they went under, passersby alerted police and fire brigade. The bodies were recovered after an hour-long operation by divers,” said an official of Balasinor police station.

India’s missile system reliable, says Rajnath Stressing that Indian pled with the emphasis on missile systems are the review of the SOPs, its “safe, secure and relievident “human error” led able”, defence minister to the accidental launch of Rajnath Singh said the the 290-km range missile standard operating prothat could have triggered a cedures for their “operconflict between the two ations, maintenance nuclear-armed neighRajnath Singh and inspections” are bours. being reviewed after the accidental firing of Stating the government had taken the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile that “serious note” of the “inadvertent release crashed 124-km inside Pakistan on March 9. of a missile”, Singh said the ongoing high-level inquiry would determine the With Singh significantly not referring exact cause of the accident. to any “technical malfunction”, and cou-

India by £150 million with the fresh agreements.

While Modi didn’t mention Ukraine in his opening remarks, Morrison brought up Russia’s "unlawful invasion’’, saying the tragic loss of life underlies the importance of holding Russia to account. "But cooperation between

like-minded liberal democracies is key to an open and inclusive and resilient and prosperous IndoPacific, and I welcome your leadership within the Quad to keeping us focused on those important issues,’’ he said. Shringla said Morrison expressed understanding for India's position "which he felt definitely reflected our own situation, our own sort of considerations’’.

The two leaders also called for cessation of hostilities and there was equal emphasis that "the international order stands on the UN Charter, on the rule of law and respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of states’’.

“Both the leaders also appreciated the increasing strategic convergence between the two countries,’’ said the government in a statement.

India restores 5-year e-tourist visas suspended in 2020 With the pandemic ebbing away, the Central government restored the five-year e-tourist visas for people from 156 countries. The move is aimed at boosting tourism, which has suffered the most during the pandemic.

Sources said that not only would foreigners be allowed to apply for fresh etourist visas but existing five-year visas will also be honoured now. Five-year visas allow foreigners multiple entries to India over the period. With tourist visas, foreigners can stay in India for up to 180 days in a year provided one stay is not longer than 90 days.

The government suspended all visas in March

2020 in the middle of a raging pandemic. With the situation improving, the government has relaxed visa rules step by step over the past two years. In October 2021, the Centre began issuing visas to all foreigners, including tourists, arriving on chartered flights. This was further relaxed to cover regular flights by November 2021.

“The decision has been taken keeping in view the improvement in the Covid19 situation in the country.

It was thought there was a need for a further relaxation of visa and travel restrictions. This will be another step in further opening up the economy and boosting tourism, which has suffered

the worst during the pandemic,” a government official said.

Sources said apart from this, the five-year regular (paper) tourist visas issued to foreigners have also been restored. They too were suspended in March 2020.

“Fresh regular tourist visas of five years’ validity have also been allowed subject to the restrictions imposed from time to time,” the official said.

The government has also restored valid longduration (10 years) regular tourist visas, which had remained suspended since March 2020, for US and Japan nationals. Fresh longduration (10 year) tourist visas have also been allowed.

Israel PM to visit India on Modi’s invitation Israel announced that PM Naftali Bennett will pay his first official visit to India on April 2 at the invitation of his counterpart Narendra Modi. The three-day visit will mark the establishment of 30 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

The visit will also take place against the backdrop of the Ukraine crisis in which Bennett reportedly is playing a peacemaker and which has also seen Modi having regular contacts with both President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy. “The purpose of the visit is to advance and strengthen the strategic alliance between the countries, and to expand bilateral ties. In addition, the leaders will discuss the

strengthening of cooperation in a variety of areas, including innovation, economy, research and development, agriculture and more,” said the Israel PM’s foreign media adviser in a statement.

Bennett had earlier described the “deep relationship” between India and Israel as one coming from the heart and not being about interests and urged Modi to work together to take the bilateral ties to “a whole new level”.

India and Israel elevated their bilateral relations to a strategic partnership during the historic visit of PM Modi to Israel in July 2017. Modi had met Bennett on the sidelines of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP 26) in Glasgow.

IN MEMORIAM Sri. B V NARAYAN It is with much sadness that we inform you all the passing of BV Narayan, the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan's custodian, on 10th March 2022. Narayanji fell ill while volunteering at the Nehru Centre, Indian High Commission and passed away at Hammersmith Hospital. Narayanji had been integral to Bhavan for over 2 decades and was much loved by staff, students and parents. He was always the very first to offer a helping hand, no matter whoever or whatever was needed. He was well known to Mathoorji and first began to visit the Bhavan to support our early activities in the 1990s.

While still working at the Centre and at Mathoorji's suggestion, Narayanji accepted a formal role at Bhavan and became our building custodian in 2005. ABPLsends condolences to Narayanji's family and prays for the departed soul.

26

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Heritage Bengal Global celebrates Holi at the Tower Bridge of London Heritage Bengal Global (HBG), a not-forprofit organisation formed by all Bengali women community in the UK celebrated Holi, the traditional Indian festival of colours at the Tower Bridge of London. This is the first time such a festival had been celebrated with such fervour at Tower Bridge and with the true spirit of unity in diversity where multi-culture diaspora of Indians from different ethnicity took part and revelled in post- covid festivities.

The event featured Bengali folk songs performed in form of flash dance, organised by the HBG members. Priyanka, Shemanti, Tamalika, Anzi, Naman, Nirrlipta and Sreya,

The 15th edition of the Jaipur Literature Festival ends with reflection, hope and debate

Piyali, Doyel, Kartika, Dhruvi and Debasree performed the flash dance renderings choreographed by Aritri. HBG Vice-

Essex Indians celebrated Holi on 19th March with huge festivity in President Community hall, Laindon West involving 150 people from every ethnic background coming from London, Harrow, Slough, Kent and Pan Essex.

dance and Unesco’s recognition of Durga puja along with the allied opportunities of cultural tourism in Bengal.

The celebration involved live Bollywood and Bengali music extravaganza and superb dance performances. The finale included a Bollyfit Zumba workshop.

A sumptuous lunch cooked by members was thoroughly enjoyed by the guests. The colour play was conducted outside the hall in open greens.

The 15th edition of the Jaipur Literature Festival concluded amid applause and fanfare at Hotel Clarks Amer, Jaipur last week. The world’s biggest ‘hybrid’ literature Festival hosted around 600 speakers, artists and performers from across India and the world. president Mahua Bej and Arijit Sarkar were the prime movers for this unique show supported by Chandreyee and Yasmita and Padmadas who helped with refreshments.

Anirban Mukhopadhyay, the director of HBG highlighted the other talking points of the event, namely the celebration of 75 years of India’s independence which was depicted with a display of tricolour during the flash

Even foreign nationals from neighbourhood areas of London participated in Overall, the programme generated huge enthusiasm amongst the people visiting the UK and the event ended with a soulful tribute to late Lata Mangeshkar, the nightingale of India and the Bollywood disco king late Bappi Lahiri rendered by the HBG members.

Changing digital culture The Pink City witnessed a variety of events namely an exclusive A Majestic Heritage Evening at Amer Fort on the 13th March 2022, the Jaipur Music Stage from 10th March-12th March 2022, and other satellite events including book launches, awards and parties hosted on the Festival’s fringes. The Festival featured conversations and debates ranging from language, war, politics, environment and climate change, gender issues, business, science and technology, history, cinema, art, travel, etc.

It saw an inspiring session on craft legacy with the CEO of Tribe Amrapali, Akanksha Arora; designer Anavila Misra, politician and writer Smriti Zubin Irani and entrepreneur Himanshu Wardhan, in conversation with columnist and author Seema Goswami. Irani talked about how in the early 2000s, it was considered down-market to adorn a saree and call yourself a young professional.

While talking about innovations, technology and sustainability, Smriti Irani said, “I also feel that there is a buzzword of sustainability and sustainable consumption across the world. And it is fascinating how the world is now waking up to the fact that India, from a perspective of craft and textile, was always predominantly sustainable.”

The last and final day of the literary celebration featured a session named Sounds of Silence with ‘Nada Yoga’ performed by Jenil Dholakia. During the session, Dholakia practised mantrachanting and healing vibrations of Tibetan singing bowls.

Morning Music had musician Priya Kanungo mesmerising audiences by singing songs dedicated to Kabir and Meera.

Essex Indians celebrate Holi

New legislation set to make digital identities more trustworthy and secure People will be able to easily and quickly prove their identity using digital methods instead of having to rely on traditional physical documents, under new plans unveiled by the government.

Following a public consultation, the government has announced it will introduce legislation to make digital identities as trusted and secure as official documents such as passports and driving licences.

Digital identities, which are a virtual form of ID, reduce the time, effort and expense that sharing physical documents can take when people need to provide legal proof of who they are, for example when buying a home or starting a new job.

A new Office for Digital Identities and Attributes (ODIA) will be set up in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport as an interim governing body for digital identities.

Digital identity solutions can be accessed in a number of ways such as via a phone app or website and can be used in-person or online to verify a person’s identity. It will be for people and businesses to decide what digital identity technology works for them to prove their identity, should they choose to create a digital identity at all.

For example, if a person wants to prove they are over 18 to buy age-restricted products, they could create a digital identity with a trusted organisation by sharing personal information such as their name and date of birth. This digital identity could then be used to prove to a retailer they are over18, without the need to reveal the personal information used to create the digital identity, boosting users’ privacy, unlike physical documents which may disclose the

date of birth, name and address.

The ODIA will have the power to issue an easily recognised Trustmark to certified digital identity organisations, to prove they meet the security and privacy standards needed to handle people’s data in a safe and consistent way.

The ODIA will ensure trust-marked organisations adhere to the highest standards of security and privacy. Digital identities can also help tackle fraud, which hit record highs with an estimated 5 million cases in the year ending September 2021, by reducing the amount of personal data shared online and making it harder for fraudsters to obtain and use stolen identities.

Lute music anthologies at risk of leaving UK An early 17th century manuscript of Italian and French lute music is at risk of leaving the country unless a UK buyer can be found.

Worth over £200,000, the manuscript is described as one of the most extensive and important sources of lute music of the early 17th century, containing 89 unidentified pieces that had never been seen before.

Instrumental music was hugely popular during the period with many in the middle class keen to enjoy musical performances.

Creating anthologies was a valuable way to preserve and share music by composers who didn’t have enough pieces to publish volumes of their own. The rich and cosmopolitan anthology will contribute to people’s understanding of how cultures flourished across national boundaries, despite the hardships and restrictions of the Thirty Years' War.

More than 370 museums and galleries eligible for DCMS/Wolfson Fund Museums and galleries across England are being encouraged to apply for a share of £4 million of new funding to improve displays, protect collections and make exhibitions more accessible to visitors.

The cash boost has been added to the joint DCMS/Wolfson Fund as the fund marks 20 years of the two organisations working together to support the arts and culture.

Both DCMS and the Wolfson Foundation will contribute an extra £2 million through their partnership as the government ramps up its plans to level up access to the arts and culture by improving collections and exhibitions in museums and galleries across the country.

Over the last 20 years, the fund has awarded £48 million to over 400 projects at museums and galleries, with organisations including Manchester Museum and the Oriental Museum in Durham receiving grants to improve entrances and display exhibits in accessible ways.

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

www.asian-voice.com

CALCIUM + Magnesium + Vit. D3

SKIN, HAIR, NAILS

Beauty Tablets

UK’S AWARD WINNING NO.1

Available from Superdrug, Holland & Barrett, Lloydspharmacy, GNC, supermarkets, health stores independent pharmacies, www.vitabiotics.com

Most trusted for pregnancy

27

sponsored by:

26 March - 1 April 2022

MOST TRUSTED VITAMINS Menopause Tablets

TABLETS For all women over 40 years Gentle IRON+Vitamin syrup

HEALTH & VITALITY Tablets

Blood tests may indicate higher risk Five foods to pregnancies in patients with Covid-19 incorporate in your A small preliminary study from Northwestern Medicine suggests that a blood test may identify the risk of stillbirth and placentitis in pregnant individuals who have had Covid-19.

Research has shown pregnant people with the virus have a higher risk of stillbirths and other pregnancy complications.

Dr. Northwestern’s Leena Mithal, the paper’s first author, said, “Right now, we don’t know if there’s placentitis until after the fact. We’re laying the groundwork for further studies so that in the future, people who are diagnosed with Covid during pregnancy may be able to get a test that will help identify pregnancies that may be at higher risk of stillbirth or fetal

distress.”

Scientists identified a link between Covid placentitis, in which the virus infects the placenta, but can only diagnose instances of placentitis after delivery by examining the placenta.

Placentitis affects between one per cent and two per cent of pregnant people infected with Covid-19.

Unlike many pregnancy complications, the risk of placentitis and stillbirth isn’t linked to the severity

of the virus.

Using a biorepository of blood taken from pregnant people during the pandemic in 2020, the scientists looked at the blood of participants who had tested positive for Covid-19 during pregnancy - six who were positive for placentitis and 12 controls who were not.

Out of those who had placentitis, two had low levels of viral RNA (called viremia) in their blood; none of the controls did. One of the people with viremia had a stillbirth, and the other had a good infant; all participants who tested negative for the marker delivered healthy babies.

Dr. Elisheva Shanes, a co-investigator of the study and assistant professor of perinatal and autopsy pathology at Feinberg, said, “The part of the placenta infected by the virus is also the part that’s in contact with maternal blood. So if there’s an infection in these cells, the virus may also be found in the blood. If a pregnant person had Covid and no placentitis, we wouldn’t expect to find the virus in the blood.”

The authors said the best way to protect both the parent and baby is to get vaccinated. Mithal said, “We don’t know why viremia does or doesn’t affect some people, but the vaccine does seem to protect against severe complications.”

Long naps linked to Alzheimer’s disease: Study Taking long naps could be an early sign of Alzheimer’s disease, according to a team of scientists who tracked the daytime sleeping habits of elderly people as part of a study. The findings suggest that an increase over time in naps was linked to a higher chance of developing mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer’s.

The scientists believe it is more likely that excessive napping could be an early warning sign, rather than it causing the mental decline.

Dr. Yue Long, an assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of California San Francisco, said, “It might be a signal of acceler-

ated ageing. The main takeaway is if you didn’t use to take naps and you notice you’re starting to get more sleepy in the day, it might be a signal of declining cognitive health.”

The team tracked more than 1,000 people, with an average age of 81, over several years. Each year, the participants wore a watchlike device to track mobility for up to 14 days. Each pro-

longed period of non-activity from 9 am to 7 pm was interpreted as a nap.

The participants also underwent tests to evaluate cognition each year. At the start of the study, 76 per cent of participants had no cognitive impairment, 20 per cent had mild cognitive impairment, and four per cent had Alzheimer’s disease.

The research said that for participants who did not develop cognitive impairment, daily daytime napping increased by an average of 11 minutes a year. The rate of increase

doubled after a diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment to a total of 24 minutes and nearly tripled to a total of 68 minutes after a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease.

Overall, participants who napped more than an hour a day had a 40% higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s than those who napped less than an hour a day; and participants who napped at least once a day had a 40% higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s than those who napped less than once a day. The scientists said feeling increasingly drowsy during the day could be an early sign that changes were underway in the brain.

first in Europe to receive this game-changing treatment thanks to another deal struck by the NHS.” He added, “From lifechanging drugs for blood cancer to new treatments for lung cancer, this is the latest in a long list of deals we have struck to provide the latest cutting-edge cancer treatments for patients - at a price that is affordable for the taxpayer. The NHS has continued to prioritise cancer care throughout the pandemic and I urge anyone with concerns, to come forward and get checked.”

Health and Social Care

Secretary Sajid Javid said, “NHS patients are the first in Europe to benefit from this cutting-edge new treatment for lung cancer.

Mobocertinib is a breakthrough drug that will be a lifeline for those with this rare form of illness. Our early access agreement through Project Orbis, an international partnership, has allowed us to make this drug available on an accelerated timescale - a fantastic example of post-Brexit global collaboration ensuring UK patients receive the best possible care and treatment for cancer.”

Lung cancer patients set to benefit from NHS’ new drug A targeted new drug for a rare and aggressive form of lung cancer will be fasttracked to eligible patients in a matter of weeks as NHS England brokered a deal to access Mobocertinib. Patients in England will be the first in Europe to access the only precision drug available to those with a mutation-driven, advanced form of lung cancer and who have already received chemotherapy.

Newly approved by the MHRA, the NHS will begin to offer the new drug to eligible lung cancer patients within weeks, following the latest early access agreement reached by NHS England.

The treatment will be

made available to around 100 eligible patients a year with the rare form of cancer that cannot be removed by surgery. Taken as a tablet, Mobocertinib specifically targets the mutation to slow the growth of cancer cells, with manageable side effects. Trials show that some patients who have taken the tablet have lived for two years after being treated with the breakthrough drug; This is significantly longer than expected for patients with this type of lung cancer.

NHS national medical director Professor Stephen Powis said, “It is fantastic news that patients in England with this extremely rare and aggressive form of lung cancer will be the

diet to get rid of stubborn belly fat Studies suggest excess belly fat or visceral fat is quite harmful. It surrounds our internal organs and puts a person at great risk of developing numerous health problems including diabetes, heart disease, liver problems, etc. The fat around our abdominal area requires quite an effort to drop and the trick to take it slow and steady. Developing some good habits like exercising regularly, avoiding refined foods, and foods high in sugar can lead to effective fat loss.

There are certain foods that could help you achieve your goal of losing belly fat. Foods like protein, citrus fruits, green vegetables, are some of the foods that can help you in your mission to stay disease-free for as long as you can.

In this article, we discuss five foods to include in your daily diet for belly fat loss.

Eggs: Eggs are high in protein and even contain the essential amino acid leucine which catalyses the fat-burning mechanism. A single egg can actually help you lose excess fat. The presence of choline in egg yolk is known to turn off the fat gain genes.

Yogurt: It contains the beneficial bacterial strain lactobacillus which reduces fat deposition.

Citrus Fruits: Limes and oranges are loaded with potassium and hence can combat bloating and fight inflammation involved in fat storage. They are loaded with potassium, a mineral important for regulating the water balance in one’s body.

Green Tea: Green tea is rich in caffeine and catechin, a flavonoid. Both these compounds help breakdown excess fat in the body.

Green veggies: Green leafy vegetables like spinach, lettuce and broccoli are not only packed with vitamins and minerals but also are low in calories and loaded with fibre.

Research says bright lighting can support healthy body rhythms A study published in the journal ‘Plos’ has put a finger on the relation between light and its influence on our body rhythms.

People with 24-hour access to electric daylight, can disrupt sleep and negatively impact health, well-being and productivity. Professors from the University of Manchester, UK, and the University of Colorado, US, brought together an international body of leading scientific experts to agree on the first evidence-based, consensus recommendations for healthy daytime, evening, and nighttime light exposure.

Recommendations by the study provide guidance to the lighting and electronics industries to aid the design of healthier environments and to improve how we light our workplaces, public buildings, and homes. The study tackles how to properly measure the extent to which different types of lighting might influence one’s body rhythms and daily patterns of sleep and wakefulness. Light affects these patterns via a specialised type of cell in the eye that uses a light-sensitive protein, melanopsin, that is distinct from the proteins in the rods and cones that support the vision. Since melanopsin is most sensitive to light in a specific part of the visual spectrum, the new recommendations used a newly-developed light measurement standard tailored to this unique property, melanotic equivalent daylight illuminance. An important step, according to the research, will be the integration of the recommendations into formal lighting guidelines, which currently focus on visual requirements rather than effects on health and well-being. Increasing sophistication in LED lighting technology and the availability of low-cost light sensors are expected to increase the ease with which individuals can optimise their personal light exposure to best support their own body rhythms in line with the new recommendations.

Professor Timothy Brown from the University of Manchester, UK, said, “These recommendations provide the first scientific consensus, quantitative, guidance for appropriate daily patterns of light exposure to support healthy body rhythms, night-time sleep and daytime alertness. This now provides a clear framework to inform how we light any interior space ranging from workplaces, educational establishments and healthcare facilities to our own homes.”

28

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Priyanka-Nick celebrate a 'lit' Holi at LA home A

ctor Priyanka Chopra and her husband singer Nick Jonas celebrated their first Holi as parents. She took to Instagram to share several pictures and videos from their celebrations at their Los Angeles home. Jonas too shared a Reel of the occasion.

In a video shared by Priyanka, the actress walks towards Nick to hug him. The couple then shares a kiss and rub their cheeks against each other. Nick applies colours to her hair and she pushes him away laughing. Pri also shared a Boomerang video where she jumped with her friends in their garden. In a photo, she is seen holding a book titled ‘Festival Of Colors’.

The last photo featured the couple with their friends and family members including Jonathan Tucker. Priyanka wore a top with shorts, sandals, earrings and a neck piece for the

Akshay on being a 'mini T-Series', says fond of buying songs

I

n a new interview, Akshay Kumar spoke about his reputation as a “mini T-Series’. He said that because he’s such a big music fan, he buys whatever song he likes so he can use it in future films. Oh, and if you are wondering who came up with the name? It was his ‘Good Newwz’ co-star Diljit Dosanjh.

Akshay said, “Jo mujhe acha lagta hai, koi music director ya kissi singer ka gaana main le leta hoon.

Mujhe shauk hai gaano ka, mujhe acha lagta hai gaane khareedna. Usse rakhe rakhta hoon, phir koi film mein jaana hota hai, woh agar uss situation mein jaata hai, toh usse use kar leta hoon (If I like a music director or singer’s song, I buy it. I love music, and I like buying songs. And then, if an appropriate film comes along, I use them there).”

Akshay was promoting his now-released ‘Bachchhan Paandey’ while in the interaction. The movie also stars Arshad Warsi, Kriti Sanon, Jacqueline Fernandez, and Pankaj Tripathi. It faces tough competition from SS Rajamouli’s epic period film ‘RRR’ which is due out a week later.

occasion while Nick wore a white shirt and matching pants. Priyanka captioned her post, “To be able to find some joy at a time when the world feels so scary is such a blessing. Happy Holi everyone. Thank you to our friends and family for playing Holi like desi’s do! Feeling blessed. #photodump #happyholi #goodoverevil #festivalofcolours.”

Priyanka was last seen on screen in ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ alongside Keanu Reeves, CarrieAnne Moss, and Jada Pinkett Smith. The actor has several projects in the pipeline including the thriller series ‘Citadel', romantic comedy ‘Text For You', action film ‘Ending Things’.

Priyanka will also be seen in ‘Jee Le Zara’, along with Alia Bhatt and Katrina Kaif.

Anushka walks away from production house Clean Slate Filmz A

ctor Anushka Sharma has taken a step back from her production company Clean Slate Filmz. She made the announcement on Instagram, adding that she will now dedicate her time to her “first love, acting”. Anushka said that as a new mother and actor, she has to balance her life “in an entirely new fashion like never before.”

Her post read, “When I started Clean Slate Filmz with my brother Karnesh Sharma, we were novices when it came to production but we had a fire in our belly and we wanted to try and set the agenda of entertainment in India through clutter-breaking content. Today, when I look back at our journey so far, I’m deeply proud of what we have created and the disruption that we have managed to achieve.”

She added, “While CSF started with my vision to change the narrative of what commercial projects should be like, I have to credit Karnesh who has excelled in shaping what CSF has become today. Being a new mother who has chosen to be an actor by profession, I have to balance my life in an entirely new fashion like never before. So, I have decided that whatever time I have at hand, I will dedicate it to my first love, acting!

Therefore, I have decided to step away from CSF, confident that the most able person, Karnesh, is taking forward the vision with which it was created in the first place.”

"I will continue to be the biggest cheerleader for Karnesh and CSF and hope to be a part of many clutter-breaking projects that would be produced by CSF. I can't wait to see how he grows the company from strength to strength with the stellar lineup of projects that he has handpicked, nurtured, and given life to. My best wishes to the entire family at CSF. Love you all! Anushka," her statement concluded.

She captioned her post, "Onwards and Upwards @kans26 @officialcsfilms! My best wishes are always with you!!" Clean Slate Filmz was started by Anushka and Karnesh in 2013. It has produced several critically acclaimed titles like ‘NH10’, ‘Pari’, Netflix’s ‘Bulbbul’, and Amazon Prime Video’s ‘Paatal Lok’. Their upcoming projects include a drama series named ‘Mai’ and Netflix’s ‘Qala’.

Anushka is set to be seen next in her upcoming film ‘Chakda Xpress’. It is inspired by cricketer Jhulam Goswami’s life and journey.

Ranveer says FIL Prakash Padukone 'makes him run across court'

A

ctor Ranveer Singh has married into a prolific sports family. While his father-in-law Prakash Padukone is an ace badminton player, sister-in-law Anisha is a gold pro, and his wife, actress Deepika Padukone is a national-level badminton player. Recently, Singh revealed that time with the Padukones can get fiercely competitive.

Speaking in an interview, Ranveer said that when he is at the Padukone residence, they often play badminton. He said that Prakash’s skills at the age of 66 are still intact and that he’s “still got it”.

The actor also added that whenever the former World No. 1 picks up a racquet, he “puts on a show” and makes his opponents run across the entire court.

“Then sometimes, when he is in the mood, he will start doing these trick shots, which would blow your mind. He is an absolute legend and the kind of wisdom about life and values that he shares with us as his kids, that is invaluable,” Ranveer said. He added that he “treasures” all the life lessons that Prakash imparts.

Ranveer also said that his wife defeats him in badminton as well. “Deepika kicks my butt in badminton, let me tell you,” he said. Adding that since they began dating in 2012, he has never beaten her ever. “It’s not for lack of trying. I am

running around sweating. There was a time when she used to beat me under five or 10 points. Now I have gotten to 1516. So, I am getting there but still unable to beat her,” he said.

Ranveer will next be seen in the film ‘Jayeshbhai Jordaar’ directed by Divyang Thakkar. He also has other films in the pipeline, including ‘Cirkus’, and ‘Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahaani’.

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

29

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

Sonam Kapoor, husband all set to welcome their first child

S

onam Kapoor took to her Instagram account to announce that she is pregnant and all set to welcome her first child with husband Anand Ahuja. The 'Neerja' actress shared some extremely stunning monochromatic pictures that see her cradling her tiny baby bump. In the caption, the actress shared that they are due in the fall this year. Sonam penned a very sweet caption with the pictures and expressed excitement to begin this new chapter in life. Kareena Kapoor too commented on Sonam's post.

In the caption, Sonam wrote, "Four hands. To raise you the very best we can.

Two hearts. That will beat in unison with yours, every step of the way. One family.

Who will shower you with love and

support. We can’t wait to welcome you. # e v e r y d a y p h e n o m e n a l #comingthisfall2022." Kareena Kapoor appeared to be the most excited one and stated that she cannot wait for babies to play together. She wrote, "Wohoooooooo soooo happy for you both can’t wait for the babies to play ." Congratulations to the happy couple.

It was on May 8, 2018 that Sonam Kapoor and Anand Ahuja had tied the knot at Anil Kapoor's residence in Mumbai.

They had been dating for a while before they decided to settle in matrimony. Post wedding, Sonam has been switching bases between Mumbai and abroad. There have been many occasions when fans have predicted their pregnancy and finally the good news is here.

Vidya reveals why she does Amitabh rings in not work with her husband Holi with family at Jalsa B

Men not willing to do a film where 60% was me: Kriti Sanon

K

riti Sanon has proven her acting skills time and again over the years. The 31-year-old actress recently made a return to commercial films with Akshay Kumar-led ‘Bachchhan Paandey.’

Kriti has been quite active in the last few years, delivering multiple projects simultaneously. She says, “I actually signed all my films in 2020, which was very strange. I think people were writing films at home and coming to me. In this period, I got very different kinds of films, which is something very exciting for me as an actor because I could choose to be a part of different kinds of worlds.”

ollywood actor Vidya Balan will soon be seen in the upcoming film ‘Jalsa’. Speaking in a recent interview, when asked why she decided to never work with her husband producer Siddharth Roy Kapur, Vidya said that after their 2013 film ‘Ghanchakkar’ did not fare well at the box office, they were both low. This prompted her to decide one of them has to be the pillar if the other’s going through a lull.

Vidya also added that in terms of monetary compensation, she will compare what a co-star is getting paid in comparison. “I’ll start comparing how much he is paying another actor vs how much he is paying me. If he is paying another actor more, I’ll hate it. I want to be the most valued in his eyes,” she said.

Vidya also said she did not want her achievements to get diluted because of her husband. “I also think that I don’t want anyone to reduce my achievements to saying this

happened for you because of your husband because one has worked very hard to get here and as much as I love him, I don’t want that to happen for either of us. It’s very reductive in a lot of ways. People say na aapka toh production house hai na and I say mere pati ka hai, mera nahi hai, fark hai.

(People say you have a production house, and I say it’s not mine, it is my husband’s, there is a difference) They don’t understand it,” she said.

'Jalsa' was released on March 18 on Amazon Prime Video.

Directed by Suresh Triveni, it also features Shefali Shah.

You know what he is thinking:

B

ollywood superstar Amitabh Bachchan had a simple celebration on the occasion of Holi. Held at his home with his family by his side, Bachchan posted pictures from the celebration on his social media accounts. The movies featured him with his wife Jaya Bachchan, daughter Shweta Bachchan Nanda, and granddaughter Navya Naveli Nanda.

Pooja Hegde on Salman

She added, “These were all the films that I was in talks through the pandemic and started shooting every time a lockdown opened up. I am just fortunate and blessed that I am finally getting the opportunity to pick different roles. There used to be a time when I was offered same kind of roles.”

Kriti said she has been receiving a variety of roles that works best for her because she wants to avoid getting typecast.

“After doing ‘Bareilly Ki Barfi’, 99 per cent of the films coming to me were small-town films in a similar genre. And now it is nice to reach a point where people are coming to me asking, ‘What kind of film do you want to do?’ Something which was very rare for me before this year. I am now able to tell people what I want to do, what world I would want to get in, or I’d love to play a grey character. This change is really nice to see.

Sometimes it happens so gradually that you don’t even realise.”

Talking about the success of her 2021 hit film ‘Mimi’, she said many male actors would feel insecure if their roles were smaller than hers. She said, “There are very, very few who would let others share screen space equally. I’ve been in situations where most men were not willing to do a film where 60 per cent was me and 40 per cent was a male actor’s role.

Nobody was willing to do it. So, I obviously think that these things need to change a little. What Akshay did in ‘Atrangi Re’ was so commendable. It was a small but good role. Akshay is so not insecure of anyone, and plays his part honestly.”

On the work front, Kriti has ‘Adipurush’, ‘Shehzada’, ‘Bhediya’ and ‘Ganpath’ in the pipeline.

Actress Pooja Hegde is all set to shoot with Bollywood star Salman Khan for ‘Kabhi Eid Kabhi Diwali’, and from what we hear, she can’t wait to start.

Speaking in an interview, she said she finds the actor’s bluntness very refreshing. Pooja was a part of Salman’s ‘DaBangg’ concert held in Dubai recently. All praises for him, she said, “I had a great touring with him. It was a lot of fun. Salman is such a real person. If he likes you, you can tell that and if he doesn’t, even that shows on his face. And that’s something I really respect because at least you know what’s on his mind.”

She added, “He is very to-your-face and I feel people like that are refreshing.

At least you know what he is thinking.” Pooja said she is excited about ‘Kabhi Eid Kabhi Diwali’, because “the girl in the film has a really good role.” The movie was supposed to release during Eid this

year, however, the pandemic shut the cork on the plans.

The film is now set to release in theatres on December 30, 2022.

On the work front, Pooja was last seen in the romantic drama ‘Radhe Shyam’, which was released to mixed reviews last week. She will be seen next in Nelson Dlipkumar’s ‘Beast’ opposite Tamil superstar Vijay.

Bachchan Sr. posted a photo from the Holika Dahan ritual, where he was seen putting a ‘tilak’ on his wife Jaya’s forehead.

He captioned the photo, “होली की अनेक अनेक शुभकामनाएँ। ॥ ”.

Several fans and celebrities showered love on the veteran Bollywood couple.

Their daughter Shweta wrote, “How cute. Happy Holi.”

Actor Ronit Roy wrote, “God bless. God bless. God bless .”

Sharing pictures from Holika Dahan on his blog, Bachchan also wrote that celebrations this year were muted, because of deaths in the family. He wrote, “holika burns amidst the moon in its brightness .. evil be destroyed .. peace and well being prevail .. the clouds of Holi bring life and light .. and may the varied colours be the colours - bright shining and in the happiest of celebrations .. celebration shall be restricted .. passings in the family on the day .. distant from home .. and the protocol of the virus ..”

Amitabh was recently seen in Nagraj Manjule’s ‘Jhund’. He will be next seen in Ajay Devgn’s ‘Runway 34’, which also stars Rakul Preet Singh and Angira Dhar.

30

www.asian-voice.com

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

26 March - 1 April 2022

Bhavana gets standing ovation at IFFK inaugural ceremony A

ctress Bhavana was featured as a surprise guest at the inaugural function of the International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK) 2022. Her appearance was quite the surprise as her name was not on the guest list until Chalachitra Academy Chairman Ranjith welcomed her on stage acknowledging her as a “woman representative of fight”.

As the actress walked on the stage, the crowd gave her a standing ovation. Bhavana shared the stage along with three others, Kurdish filmmaker Lisa Calan, Bangladeshi actress Azmeri Haque Badhon, and Thiruvananthapuram Mayor Arya Rajendra. Bollywood director Anurag Kashyap was the chief guest.

Bhavana thanked the festival’s artistic director Bina

Pawan Kalyan’s ‘Bheemla Nayak’ gets OTT release date P

awan Kalyan-starrer ‘Bheemla Nayak’ hit theatres on February 25, setting the Telugu box office on fire. And now, a month after the release, the movie is all set to drop on OTT platforms. The Saagar K Chandra directorial revolves around the ego clash between a police officer and an ex-army officer. It will start streaming on Disney Plus Hotstar and Aha from March 25 onwards.

The movie opened to mixed reviews in February. In an interview earlier, director Saagar K Chandra said that the first challenge of making the remake was to create a larger-than-life character for Pawan Kalyan. He said, “When Trivikram and I were discussing adapting the film in Telugu, the first challenge was to make Biju Menon’s character larger than life and ensure that the film revolved around him.

The character was played by Pawan Kalyan in Telugu.”

He added, “In ‘Ayyappanum Koshiyum’, Koshi’s character was more important. So, in Telugu, a kind of paradigm shift happened. We then had to crunch a 3-hour film into less than 2 hours 30 minutes. The original version was a procedural film, with most of the emotional outburst limited to the last 30 minutes. It’s difficult to keep the audience engaged for half an hour without a change in the arc. To push up the tempo, we made many changes,” he said.

Paul and Academy Chairman Ranjith for inviting her.

She said, “My best wishes for all who make good cinema and enjoy good cinema and also for women who fight against all odds like Lisa Calan.”

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan presented the Spirit of Cinema award to Lisa Calan at the inaugural function. He said, “This government is with all the women who are committed in the field of cinema.”

Cultural Affairs Minister Saji Cheriyan acknowledged Bhavana’s presence, calling her a ‘Role model of Kerala’. The inaugural function was followed by a screening of the opening film ‘Rehana’, directed by Abdullah Mohammed Saad.

Dhanush congratulates 'friend' Aishwaryaa on new song T amil superstar Dhanush is all praise for his ex-wife Aishwaryaa Rajinikanth’s latest song ‘Payani’. He took to Twitter and shared the song’s video and wrote, “Congrats my friend @ash_r_dhanush on

The word pan-India 'really irks' Dulquer Salmaan

A

ctor Dulquer Salmaan says he is puzzled by the common use of the term pan-India for movies. Ever since SS Rajamouli’s two-part action-fantasy series ‘Baahubali’ was released between 2015 and 2017, it is credited for bridging the gap between the South and North film industries. Since then, the word pan-India gained momentum and Southern movies like Vijay’s ‘Master’ and Allu Arjun’s ‘Pushpa’ made new box-office records in Hindi regions.

“The word pan-India really irks me. I just don’t like hearing it. I love that there is so much exchange of talent happening in cinema, it’s great, but we are one country. I don’t think anyone says panAmerica. I don’t get it, even though they say it sweetly,” Dulquer said.The 35-yearold actor said the movies that travelled across India are the ones that were essentially made for one market. If one designs their project to cater to all, the actor believes the film “won’t belong anywhere”. He added, “You can’t engineer a pan-India film. Those films that have actually travelled across India are the ones that were rooted and made for one market. If you try to do a ‘panIndia’ film, try to appeal to all audiences for different markets, it will not belong anywhere.”

Apart from acting, Dulquer Salmaan also produces movies under his banner Wayfarer Films, which he launched in 2020. He said production gives him more control of his films, right from the budget to ensure they get a good release. “Before I became an actor, my dad had produced a few films but they hadn’t really worked. We had some luck in producing TV content but not exactly films. The landscape was also different then.

Now, there are so many outlets, satellites, OTTs, the markets have grown. Now you can mount a film and land safely.”

On the work front, Dulquer is set to feature in the mystery thriller film ‘Salute’ opposite Diana Penty who will make her Malayalam debut.

your music video #payani. God bless”.

Aishwaryaa soon retweeted Dhanush’s post and wrote, “Thank you Dhanush… .Godspeed.”

Aishwaryaa’s directorial music venture, the Tamil song has been sung by Anirudh, with music by Anti Toward, and lyrics by

Viveka. It features Jani Master and Shrasti Verma. A love ballad, ‘Payani’ tells the story of two lovers from their daily lives. They only wish to fulfill each other’s dreams and desires, even it means trying to make ends meet. The track is a soft number and the visuals are relatable to any couple exploring their new love.

The song was released by Aishwaryaa’s father Rajinikanth on social media. He tweeted, “Happy to release #Payani, music single directed by my daughter Aishwarya, who is back to direction after a long gap of 9 years. I Wish you the very best always @ash_r_dhanush..god bless .. love you ..”

Dhanush and Aishwaryaa announced their separation earlier this year by issuing a joint statement. They have two sons, Yatra Raja and Linga Raja.

TV Listing

* Schedule is subject to change

MON 28 MAR - FRI 1 APR 2022 6.00 Palav Bhini Preet 9.00 SHUBH PRABHAT 9.30 SUR PRABHAT 15.00 RASOI SHOW 17.30 SHRIMAD BHAGWAT MAHAPURAN 18.00 DESHI BEATS 18.30 SURI 19.00 BHAKT GORA KUMBHAR 19.30 MARU MAN MOHI GAYU 20.00 RASHI RIKSHAWALI 20.30 MOTI BAA NI NANI VAHU 21.00 SORATHNI MRS SINGHAM 21.30 GEETA SATURDAY 26 MAR 2022 6.00 Sol Somvar 9.00 SHUBH PRABHAT 9.30 SUR PRABHAT

* Schedule is subject to change

MON 28 MAR - FRI 1 APR 2022 16.30 RASOI SHOW DESI FLAVOURS 17.30 CHHUTA CHHEDA 18.00 SASURAL SIMAR KA 18.30 TU AASHIQUI 19.00 BHAGYA KA LIKHA 20.00 SWARAN GHAR 20.30 DIL SE DIL TAK 21.00 THAPKI PYAR KI 2 21.30 SASURAL SIMAR KA 2

10.00 MOTU PATLU 11.00 GATTU BATTU 15.00 RASOI SHOW 17.30 SHRIMAD BHAGWAT MAHAPURAN 18.00 DESHI BEATS 18.30 SURI 19.00 BHAKT GORA KUMBHAR 19.30 MARU MAN MOHI GAYU 20.00 RASHI RIKSHAWALI 20.30 MOTI BAA NI NANI VAHU 21.00 SORATHNI MRS SINGHAM 21.30 GEETA SUNDAY 27 MAR 2022 9.00 SHUBH PRABHAT 9.30 SUR PRABHAT 10.00 MOTU PATLU 11.00 GATTU BATTU 12.00 Ghar Ek Pakhkhino Malo 15.00 Dhaakad 18.00 DESHI BEATS 18.30 MARU MAN MOHI GAYU 19.00 SHU CHALE CHE 19.30 GEETA 20.30 SORATHNI MRS SINGHAM 22.00 SHU CHALE CHE

SATURDAY 16 MAR 2022 15.00 SHU CHALE CHE 16.30 RASOI SHOW - DESI FLAVOURS 17.30 DESI BEAT 3 18.00 SASURAL SIMAR KA 18.30 TU AASHIQUI 19.00 BHAGYA KA LIKHA 20.00 COMEDY NIGHTS WITH KAPIL 21.00 THAPKI PYAR KI 2 21.30 SASURAL SIMAR KA 2 SUNDAY 27 MAR 2022 16.30 RASOI SHOW - DESI FLAVOURS 17.30 DESI BEAT 3 18.00 BFFs with Vogue - Season 1 19.00 THE ANUPAM KHER SHOW-SEASON 1 20.00 COMEDY NIGHTS WITH KAPIL 21.00 COMEDY NIGHTS WITH KAPIL

AsianVoiceNews

AsianVoiceNewsweekly

CROSS-PLATFORM

www.asian-voice.com

31

26 March - 1 April 2022

Kareena to make digital debut with Sujoy Ghosh’s murder mystery K

areena Kapoor Khan is all set to make her digital debut with Sujoy Ghosh’s untitled murder mystery.

Netflix India made the announcement last week and revealed the project is an adaptation of the Japanese novel 'The Devotion of Suspect X' by Keigo Higashino. The movie will also feature Jaideep Ahlawat and Vijay Varma in pivotal roles.

Ghosh said in a statement, “Devotion is probably the best love story I’ve ever read, and to get a chance to adapt it into a film is such an honour. Plus I get a chance to work with Kareena, Jaideep and Vijay!!! What more can one ask for!!”

Meanwhile, Bebo said her first digital project “has all the right ingredients”.

She said, “I can’t wait to begin work on this exciting project. It’s one that has all the right ingredients - a great story, a visionary director and a super talented cast and crew. I am really looking forward to working with Sujoy, Jaideep and Vijay. It’s the beginning of an electrifying journey and I can’t wait for audiences worldwide to see this global bestseller come to life.”

The movie is produced by 12th Street Entertainment, Northern Lights Film in association with Boundscript and Kross Pictures.

Ammy Virk wants to make 'pan-India films' in Punjab P

unjabi actor and singer Ammy Virk wants to broaden his horizon as a filmmaker. He made his Bollywood debut with Kabir Khan’s directorial ’83’ earlier this year. Virk said, “I feel ‘Qismat’ (Punjabi film) should be remade in Hindi. And as we usually take 45 days to wrap up a film, if we take 65 days, we can shoot a movie in both languages: Hindi and Punjabi. We are trying to do that. I want to make pan India Punjabi films.”

Currently, in Mumbai shooting for a project, Virk says “mera dil lagta hai yaha pe”. He admits he has been getting good offers since his last Hindi film. “I was waiting for good projects after ’83’. And now I’m getting them. Good people are approaching me for work. I have been offered leads, second leads. Haan, kam karenge but acche karenge.”

The 29-year-old has completed a decade in showbiz and feels extremely “blessed”. He said, “Recently I had a masla going on in Punjab concerning the protests. That was an unexpected thing because there was no fault of mine. But I was able to put forward my point in front of my audience, and they accepted and loved me again. Every time, some misunderstandings have happened, I have always been able to mend things.”

On the work front, Virk revealed he is doing a movie for Karan Johar’s production house and another biopic.

Oscar Isaac, Iman Vellani is Ethan Hawke Marvel’s first- send Holi wishes ever Muslim to Indian fans superhero H M

arvel has finally welcomed another superhero in its vast universe. The Marvel Cinematic Universe released the trailer of Iman Vellani-starrer ‘Ms Marvel’ recently. The web series is the story of a Muslim American teenager Kamala Khan who wants to be like Captain Marvel.

The trailer introduces us to the South Asian character and her world.

The series features a diverse cast of Asian and American actors including Mohan Kapur, Nimra Bucha, Aramis Knight, Saagar Shaikh, Rish Shah, Zenobia Shroff, Matt Lintz, Yasmeen Fletcher, Laith Nakli, Agar Usman, and Travina Springer.

It is also speculated that Bollywood actor Farhan Akhtar and Pakistani actor Fawad Khan will also be a part of the project.

However, no official confirmation is received at the moment. ‘Ms Marvel’ starts streaming from June 8 on Disney Plus Hotstar.

ollywood stars Oscar Isaac and Ethan Hawke, who are currently promoting their upcoming Marvel series ‘Moon Knight’, wooed their Indian fans with a clip wishing them for the occasion of Holi. In a new promo video released by Disney+ Hotstar last week, both the actors sent Holi wishes to fans while also reminding them that their movie is set to premiere on March 30.

Oscar and Ethan start with a “Namaste India” and go on to say, “We are here to bring you one more reason to celebrate.” The rest of the video includes footage from the trailers we’ve seen so far. Oscar adds, “Our series promises a whole new world of heroes and villains… unlike anything you’ve seen before.”

Ethan says, “We’re excited to bring this new story to millions of fans in India and we hope you love and enjoy it.” ‘Moon Knight’ follows Steven Grant, a mild-mannered gift-shop employee who becomes plagued with blackouts and memories of another life. Steven discovers he has dissociative identity disorder and shares a body with mercenary Marc Spector.

They must navigate their complex identities while thrust into a deadly mystery among the powerful gods of Egypt.

32

www.asian-voice.com

26 March - 1 April 2022

AsianVoiceNews AsianVoiceNewsweekly

Bright chance for Indian women's team to reach semis After back-to-back losses to the defending champions England and Australia, the Indian women's cricket team's campaign got back on track on Tuesday, March 22 in Hamilton as they managed to achieve a comfortable 110-run win over their neighbours Bangladesh.

Yastika Bhatia’s gritty halfcentury and Sneh Rana’s allround performance powered India a dominating 110-run win over Bangladesh and kept them in the hunt for a semifinal spot at the ICC Women’s World Cup. Opting to bat, India recovered from a mid-inning collapse to post a modest 229 for seven, riding on a responsible 80-ball 50 by Bhatia

and a late flourish from Rana (27) and Pooja Vastrakar (30).

Defending the total, the spinners, led by Rana (4/30), controlled the proceedings as they struck at regular intervals.

India bowled out Bangladesh for 119 in 40.3 overs to register their third win of the tournament. The big win helped India improve their NetRun-Rate (0.768) further.

After a 155-run win against the West Indies in their third game of the tournament, the 2017 runners-up looked on track to seal a semis berth, however, consecutive losses against the two top sides derailed their campaign to an extent where a top-four finish looked improbable.

in brief LAKSHYA LOSES ALL ENGLAND FINAL TO WORLD NO 1

However, a few other results going their way in the last couple of days have meant that the Women in Blue have the destiny in their own hands.

With Pakistan bringing up their first win of the competition against the high-flying West Indies and England ending the home side New Zealand's chances, India now have a clear way to a spot in the semi-finals.

India eclipsed West Indies at the No. 3 spot in the points table with a positive net run rate even though both teams have three wins against their name.

On the other hand, South Africa's unbeaten run came to an end in the earlier game when they faced off the marauding Meg Lanning-led Australian side.

If India do win their last game against South Africa, they will qualify for the semi-finals.

However, in case of a loss, the scenario could face an NRR conundrum featuring three sides - England, West Indies and India. The Women in Blue are well-placed in that regard as they have a positive net run rate of +0.77.

Football regulator could Bumrah breaks into top reduce competition, 5, Jadeja displaced as No warns think tank 1 Test all-rounder Calls for an Independent Regulator for Football (IREF) – as set out in Tracey Crouch’s Fan Led Review of Football Governance – are gathering steam. A new paper from the Institute of Economic Affairs warns the move could undermine England’s position as home to the world’s most vibrant and competitive leagues.

The cost of the IREF will be paid for by clubs seeking licences. It would not be unreasonable to suggest the direct and indirect costs to Premier League clubs could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds. The situation with Chelsea, where government has strict control of all outgoings and even of ticket sales, shows that far from bringing stability and protecting fans, regulatory interventions could severely hamper clubs and even cause them to go out of business.

A report from the Institute of Economic Affairs urges government to reconsider its

support for the Fan Led Review of Football Governance, casting doubt on the need for and benefits of a new statemandated regulatory system.

Under the proposed regulatory model, clubs will be forced to submit a wealth of financial and other information – including detailed business models and equality, diversity and inclusion plans. All will have to be approved before a licence, which must be renewed each year, is granted.

Monitoring and collating this material and investigating clubs for potential breaches will require a substantial number of regulatory staff. The Review team had no experience and showed little understanding of how regulatory bodies operate in practice.

Excessively tight regulation of who can be an owner or director could make it difficult for clubs to replace existing owners, particularly at lowerleague levels. This could be a new threat to their survival.

After yet another splendid outing against Sri Lanka, India's premier seamer Jasprit Bumrah saw a massive rise in his ICC rankings.

Bumrah, who was at the 10th position, jumped six spots and is now placed fourth.

Bumrah picked a total of eight wickets in the Day/Night Test played in Bengaluru, which India won by 238 runs. He climbed past Shaheen Afridi, Kyle Jamieson, Tim Southee, James Anderson, Neil Wagner and Josh Hazlewood in the Test rankings for bowlers. Captain Rohit Sharma, who had a quiet series against Sri Lanka accumulating just 90 runs in the two Tests, held on to his sixth position to be the best-placed Indian in the batting charts.

Rishabh Pant, who was named Player of the Series, remained static at 10th. Virat Kohli, on the other hand, dropped four spots and now finds himself at the 9th position. Kohli scored 45 in the opening Test in Mohali, while in the second Test he had scores of 23 and 13. He is yet to

IPL 2022 all set to begin on March 27 The 15th season of the Indian Premier League (IPL) will start on March 27 and the final of the cash-rich tournament will be played by the end of May. The BCCI will release the full schedule soon.

Taking a lesson from last year's experience during IPL 2021, the board is not ready to take unnecessary risks this time and will organize all 70 league matches in Maharashtra itself. The IPL 2022 players' auction recently concluded in Bangalore.

BCCI officials believe that by organizing the entire league phase in Maharashtra, flight travel can be avoided, which

will reduce the risk of Covid-19.

According to a report, Reliance Jio stadium has been included in the probable list of venues and most likely matches will be played at this ground as well.

This stadium is equipped with all modern facilities and at present it is the home ground of Mumbai Indians.

BCCI has reportedly shortlisted six venues, four each in Mumbai, Pune and

Ahmedabad, for IPL 2022.

However, Jio Stadium is yet to get clearance from the broadcast team. The IPL 2022 playoffs and final are expected to be played at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.

score a century since his 136 against Bangladesh in November 2019.

Ravindra Jadeja, who emerged as the leading run-scorer and scalped 10 wickets, was displaced as the top-ranked allrounder. West Indies' Jason Holder reclaimed the number one spot in the all-rounder's ranking.

The in-form Shreyas Iyer was rewarded for his match-winning 92 and 67 against Sri Lanka as he took a giant leap, advancing 40 spots to be on 37th position in the batting chart. Sri Lanka Test captain Dimuth Karunaratne jumped up to a career best No 3 after his fighting 107 in the second innings in Bangalore.

Ravichandran Ashwin, Shakib Al Hasan and Ben Stokes rounded off the top five in the allrounders' list. In the bowlers' ranking, Mohammed Shami climbed up a spot to displace fellow countryman Ravindra Jadeja to 17th. Pat Cummins, Ashwin and Kagiso Rabada have retained the top three spots among the bowlers.

Lakshya Sen faltered at the final hurdle of the All England Badminton Championships in Birmingham. His 10-21, 15-21 loss to Denmark’s Viktor Axelsen means India’s 21year-old jinx at this tournament continues Pullela Gopichand was the last Indian to win the title in 2001. It was sweet revenge for Axelsen, who had lost to his training partner Lakshya in the semifinal of the German Open last week. Disappointed with his loss, Lakshya said, “I came with a strategy on how to play the final. But today he was solid. In the first game, I made a lot of errors. In the second game I did well but he was too good.

Credit to him. He played very well.” Axelsen was obviously delighted. “I am very happy, as happy as I was when I won the title here the first time. I wanted to start by hitting hard. I also think Lakshya was a little tired after the tough match a day earlier.”

JHULAN BECOMES 2ND WOMEN CRICKETER TO PLAY 200 ODIS Veteran India pacer Jhulan Goswami achieved yet another milestone as she becomes the second women cricketer to play 200 ODIs on Saturday against Australia in the ongoing ICC women’s ODI World Cup 2022. Mithali Raj holds the record of playing the highest number of ODIs in women’s cricket. She has played 230 ODIs so far. Mithali is leading Team India in the current World Cup. At number three is former England cricketer Carlot Edwards, who played 191 ODIs. Earlier, the 39-year-old became the first player to take 250 wickets in women’s ODIs. Jhulan had become the highest wicket-taker in the Women’s World Cup. Jhulan surpassed the tally of 39 wickets taken by Lynette Ann Fullston of Australia from 1982 to 1988.

FAMILY, FRIENDS SAY GOODBYE TO WARNE Shane Warne’s family and friends have attended a private funeral in his hometown of Melbourne to pay their final respects to the cricketing legend. Warne’s three children, parents and friends including retired Test captains Mark Taylor and Allan Border and former England skipper Michael Vaughan, were among about 80 guests at the service on Sunday. Warne was widely regarded as one of the top players of all time. He died on March 4 while on vacation with friends on Samui Island in southern Thailand. An autopsy report said the 52-year -old died of a suspected heart attack. His remains were repatriated from Bangkoka week ago.

Bengaluru pitch rated ‘below average’ by ICC The pitch at the M Chinnaswamy stadium in Bengaluru– venue for the second and final Test match between India and Sri Lanka last week – has been rated ‘below average’. The rating has been given by Javagal Srinath, the ICC match referee, in his report to the world governing body. As a result, the venue, which hosted its maiden Day/Night Test encounter was docked one demerit point under the ICC Pitch and Outfield Monitoring Process. The low-scoring contest ended within three days with the home side registering a commanding

238-run victory over the Islanders. The pitch, a rank turner from Day 1, drew a lot of flak after 16 wickets fell on the opening day.

Of the 39 wickets that fell on either side, the spinners accounted for 26, with India’s lead pacer Jasprit Bumrah being the most successful fast bowler with a match haul of eight wickets. In his report, Srinath, a former pacer himself, noted, “The p itch offered a lot of turn on the first day itself and though it improved with every session, in my view, it was not an even contest between bat and ball. ”