DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PUNE, PATNA, VADODARA ● REG.NO. MCS/067/2018 - 20 RNI REGN. NO. 1543/57 JOURNALISM OF COURAGE WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 2025, MUMBAI, LATE CITY, 20 PAGES `5.00 ● WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM SINCE 1932 EX-PM KHANAL’S WIFE DIES OF INJURIES HELICOPTERS FERRY LEADERS TO SAFETY Gen Z’s coup in Kathmandu: Leaders picked out, assaulted; Army moves in EX-PM DEUBA ASSAULTED FINANCE MINISTER CHASED, KICKED MP STRIPPED, DRAGGED ON STREET JAGDEEP DHANKHAR SENDS HIS WISHES Vice President-elect C P Radhakrishnan with Union Ministers J P Nadda, Pralhad Joshi and Ram Mohan Naidu. PTI Radhakrishnan is new V-P, Opp falls short of own tally amid invalid votes, cross-vote fears MANOJ C G & LIZ MATHEW NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 9 Former Nepal PM Sher Bahadur Deuba bleeds after being assaulted; Finance Minister Bishnu Prasad Paudel kicked and chased through streets; ruling MP Ek Nath Dhakal stripped. Video grabs YUBARAJ GHIMIRE NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 9 AMID A deepening political crisisinNepal,followingasharpescalation in the anti-government “Gen Z protests” a day after 20 youths were killed in police action, Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli resigned on Tuesday. Defying curfew orders, protesters hit the streets for the seconddayinKathmandu,blocking roads, storming government buildings — including Parliament, the President’s office,SupremeCourtandpolitical party offices — and setting them on fire, targeting the private residences of President Ram Chandra Poudel, Oli and some former Prime Ministers among others, and also, in some cases, CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 10/09/2025 88 116 142 75 THE EDITORIAL PAGE QUAKE IN NEPAL Pent-up discontent has pushed country’s youth to take to streets. Delhi should keep a close eye on the situation P8 EXPLAINED WHY KATHMANDU IS BURNING P15 CCS meets: Heart-rending, young lives lost, says Modi, calls for calm SHUBHAJIT ROY NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 9 WITHIN HOURS of the fall of the K P Sharma Oli government in Kathmandu where leaders were singled out and assaulted Tuesday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on BUSINESS AS USUAL BY UNNY Security to discuss the situation in Nepal and said the violence there was “heart-rending”. He also expressed “anguish” that “many young people have lost their lives” in the protests. Underlining that “stability, peace and prosperity” of Nepal areof utmostimportance,heappealed to the people of Nepal to “support peace”. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Mired in graft and abuse of power, Oli ignored warning YUBARAJ GHIMIRE NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 9 IN HIS FOURTH term as Prime Minister, K P Sharma Oli, who took charge of Nepal once more in July 2024, appeared to be enjoying absolute power. He was also moving to retain the leadership of the Communist Party of Nepal(UnifiedMarxist-Leninist) FULL COVERAGE P16 A meeting of the CCS was heldsoonafterModireturnedto New Delhi from a tour of the flood-hit areas in the north. “On my return from Himachal Pradesh and Punjab today, a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security discussed the developments in Nepal. The violence in Nepal is for the third time, riding roughshod over any dissent. Buthisacerbictongueandiron fist had made him increasingly unpopular,somethingherefused to acknowledge. Lastweek,theOliCabinetdecided to ban 26 social media platforms including Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger where details of alleged political CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 What next? Army says will protect, new govt up in air YUBARAJ GHIMIRE NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 9 WITH VIOLENT protests triggering the fall of the government in Kathmandu, President Ram ChandraPoudel,whoappearedto be in the safe protection of the Nepal Army, Tuesday acceptedtheresignation of Prime Minister K P ● Sharma Oli. But there is uncertainty on how the situation will unfold in the coming days. A press release by the President’s office said while Oli’s resignationhasbeenaccepted,he has been asked to continue until further arrangements are made. The President’s act of asking the PM, whose fate and whereabouts are not known, to E CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 PM tours flood-hit areas: MARATHA QUOTA ‘GR not discussed in Cabinet, needs to `1,600 crore for Punjab, `1,500 crore for Himachal be withdrawn’: Bhujbal writes to CM KAMALDEEP SINGH BRAR & SAURABH PARASHAR GURDASPUR, SHIMLA, SEPTEMBER 9 PRIME MINISTER Narendra Modi Tuesday visited Punjab and Himachal Pradesh to take stock of the grim situation caused by the floods and rainfall inseveraldistrictsacrossthetwo states. PM Modi conducted an aerial survey of the deluge-ravaged belts in Punjab, which has been battling one of its worst floods. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 ALOK DESHPANDE MUMBAI, SEPTEMBER 9 MAHARASHTRA MINISTER and NationalistCongressParty(NCP) leader Chhagan Bhujbal, in his capacity as the founder-president of Akhil Bharatiya Mahatma Phule Samata Parishad, on Tuesday wrote to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, seeking withdrawal or modificationof theGovernment Resolution (GR) issued on September 2 regarding the implementation of Hyderabad Gazetteer, which will help the Maratha community get Kunbi (OBC) status. Bhujbal stated that the GR was issued in haste under tremendous pressure from one powerfulcommunity,withoutit beingputbeforetheCabinet,not considering any objections and suggestions. “We, therefore, have no choice but to write to you seeking withdrawal of the CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 RESULT BETTER THAN EXPECTED: BJP; CONG SEES MORAL VICTORY PAGE 10 the YSRCP’s 11 MPs. Some MPs representingsmallerpartiesalso backed him. This made Radhakrishnan’s victory a foregone conclusion, way above the halfway mark of 377. But the final tally surpassed the expectations of the BJP, which hoped for around 440 votes for Radhakrishnan. The Congress’s confidence, on the other hand, evaporated CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 THE WORLD ISRAEL ATTACKS HAMAS LEADERS IN QATAR, DRAWS CONDEMNATION EXPLAINED Oli-garchy falls: PM quits, President offers to talk to protesters as Parliament set ablaze CHANDRAPURAMPONNUSAMI Radhakrishnan was elected India’s 15th Vice-President on Tuesday, defeating B Sudershan Reddy by a margin of 152 votes. The outcome came as a jolt to the Opposition bloc, whose hopes of securing at least 320plusvotesappearedtohavebeen dashed by cross-voting. NDA nominee Radhakrishnan, 67, an old-time RSS and BJP leader, secured 452 of the 752 valid votes polled — with 15 declared invalid — against Reddy’s 300. The BJP-led NDA had on paper 427 MPs, plus the support of FULL COVERAGE PAGE 13 GST 2.0: Amid concern of ‘profiteering’, FinMin to compile price data of common use items Shampoo to biscuits and medicines, prices of 54 items to be monitored AANCHAL MAGAZINE NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 9 AMID CONCERNS the industry may not fully transmit the benefits of the GST rate cuts to endconsumers, the Revenue Department under the Union Ministry of Finance has asked its officers in the field to compile monthly data reports on price changeof commoditiespre-and post-GST rate rationalisation. The new rates will be effective September 22. In a letter to principal chief commissioners and chief commissioners of central GST zones on Tuesday, the department has sought commodity-wise price data on fast-moving consumer goods, food and educational items, and drugs and medicines, as well as cement and white goods, from the field offices and tradeassociationsundertheirjurisdiction for the next six months.Thefirstreporthastobe submitted by September 30. The field offices have been CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 What was the Harappan language? Culture Ministry to hold meet on script PAGE 1 ANCHOR VIKAS PATHAK NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 9 ADIVERSEgroupcomprisingarchaeologists, a cancer specialist, an aerospace engineer, and a retired government official will gather in New Delhi on the Union Ministry of Culture’s invitation from September 11 to 13 to present their findings on attempts to decipher the Harappan script, which has puzzled historians ever since the remains of the long-lost civilizationwerediscoveredinHarappa and Mohenjo Daro in the early 1920s.Todate,therehasbeenno crediblebreakthroughindecoding the script. Accordingtotheprogramme schedule of the international conference, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend the conferenceonSeptember12and UnionHomeMinisterAmitShah willbepresentthefollowingday. Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA) member secretary Sachchidanand Joshi confirmed the plans for the conference, and said details would be shared soon. The IGNCA is an autonomous institution under the Ministry of Culture. The papers that are set to be presented have varied conclusions. While a few claim that the underlyinglanguageof thescript is Sanskrit, some claim it to be a Dravidian language, and some linkittospecifictriballanguages such as Santali and Gondi. Software engineer Bahata Mukhopadhyay,whohasworked on the Harappan script for years DECODING THE SCRIPT WHILE SOME papers claim Wikimedia IGNCA SET to host an international conference from September 11 to 13 on attempts to decipher the Harappan script the script’s underlying language is Sanskrit, some claim it to be a Dravidian language, and some link it to Adivasi languages such as Santali and Gondi DECIPHERING BECOMES easy when script is on a bilingual object, as with Brahmi. It hasn’t happened with Harappan script yet and also published peer-reviewed papers on the subject, was guarded about the conclusions she will present at the conference. “No serious scholar can claim to have completely deciphered the script, but I believe I have made progress on it. My findings are that it is not a spelling-based script. Rather, it encodesrulesandinformationregarding ancient taxation and commerce,” she told The Indian Express. One of the participants is archaeologist Karuna Shankar Shukla, the preface of whose 2024 book reads, “A study of the Indussealshasrevealedtomeby the grace of Lord Ganesh that very few of the total seals were meant for stamping the bales of merchandise … even the 70 sealings found in the warehouse of Lothal’s port were meant for religious purposes; for a Rig Vedic mantra was inscribed in their original seal … Again, for the first time, I have been able to read the names of the Puranas on the Indus seals.” The book is available on the website of IGNCA, where he was a senior research fellow. However, ac- cordingtohistoricalresearch,the PuranaswerecomposedwayaftertheHarappancivilisationdisappeared. Retired engineer Prakash N Salame,whoisfromNagpur,will present a paper titled “Decipherment of the Indus Script with the Help of Root Morphemes of the ProtoDravidianLanguageGondi”.“My late mentor Dr M C Kangali deciphered the Harappan script as early as 2002. I am carrying his work forward and have deciphered 90% of the symbols. It is CONTINUED ON PAGE 2