The ideas Page: Pm modi needs a Kamaraj Plan. Will he bite the bullet? 11 FRIDAY, JUNE 26, 2026 JournaliSm of Courage NEw dELhI, LATE CITY, 20 PAgES ₹7.00 (₹8 RAIPuR, ₹15 SRINAgAR) l www.indianexpress.com dA I LY F R o M : A h M E dA b A d , C h A N d I gA R h , d E L h I , j A I P u R , Ko L K ATA , L u C K N o w , M u M b A I , N Ag P u R , PAT N A , P u N E , vA d o dA R A AYodHYA trUSt member comPlAinAnt After A neArlY tWo-YeAr SUSPenSion FIR against 8 over theft of donations at Ram temple From Sunday, India will resume tourist visas for Bangladesh nationals: Trivedi Envoy presents credentials in Dhaka, Delhi grants him Cabinet Minister status divya A New Delhi, June 25 Moving to improve bilateral relations, india thursday announced the resumption of tourist visas for Bangladeshi nationals after a nearly twoyear suspension. the announcement was made by the newly appointed indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh, Dinesh trivedi, during a visit to the indian visa Application Centre (ivAC) in Dhaka. Delhi suspended tourist visas for Bangladeshi nationals inAugust2024followingpolitical unrest and the ouster of the SheikhHasina-ledgovernment. trivedi announced that touristvisaapplicationswillresume on June 28, at five visa centres, including the one in Dhaka. thiswashisfirstannouncement after presenting his credentials to the President of Bangladesh, Mohammed Shahabuddin, thursday after- happening today lUnion Home Minister Amit Shah will chair the 10th apex-level meeting of the Narco-Coordination Centre with focus on tackling the challenges posed by synthetic drugs, darknet-enabled trafficking and expanding the reach of rehabilitation centres. l AccommodAting Ex-driver of Trust gen secy among those named; action after SIT report goes to CM rescue workers search through the rubble after powerful earthquakes in caracas, Venezuela on wednesday. AP more rePorTs, page 14 Indian envoy to Bangladesh dinesh Trivedi with President mohammed shahabuddin in dhaka. @IhCdhAKA The ediTorial page Thousands feared killed as twin quakes rock Venezuela, many trapped under rubble My absence is not silence. i will return through the strength of the people Official toll 188 so far, USGS says may cross 10,000 SHeikH HASinA WAzed, Vivian Sequera, mayela Armas & deisy buitrago FoRMER bANgLAdESh PM page 10 La Guaira, Caracas, June 25 noon, signalling that he has been tasked with repairing ties between the two countries. »continUed on PAge 2 tHoUSAnDS oF venezuelans were feared dead on thursday after two powerful earthquakes,includingthecountry’s ‘Aligns with democratising access to AI, digitising small businesses, creating jobs’ Track These and more on www.indianexpress.com page 6 Pm narendra modi with amazon ceo andy Jassy on Thursday. PTI george mathew Mumbai, June 25 not Me in video, actor wearing Mask with My face, says Mann explained if passport is not proof of citizenship, what is? Page 12 explained page 12 behind earthquake devastation: rare ‘seisMic doublet’, vulnerable location years of economic turmoil that had left much of its infrastructure fragile, complicating rescue and recovery efforts. in some areas, emergency workersscrambledoverthedebris of collapsed buildings through the evening and into thursday. in others, residents decried a lack of help. JorgeRodriguez,whoheads venezuela's national assembly and is the brother of interim President Delcy Rodriguez, said at least 188 people were confirmed dead and 200 were trapped. He said 1,520 people were injured and at least 250 buildingshadbeendamagedor destroyed. the worst-affected area, »continUed on PAge 2 Amazon ramps up AI, BJP defends MP CM, silent on his firm cloud infra investment buying land, 4-fold jump since 2021 in India, takes total to Firm where Mohan Yadav, wife Seema hold 73% bought at least 2.6 acres for Rs 1.43 cr after he became Chief Minister $48 billion by 2030 VAibHAVSooryavanshi in the team will be the toughest riddle for the management when India step into a new T20 era under Shreyas Iyer in the first of a twomatch series against Ireland. poliTics strongest in over a century, wreaked havoc in and around the capital Caracas, trapping people beneath the rubble of collapsedbuildingsandsetting off powerful aftershocks. Amagnitude7.2earthquake hit about 160 km west of CaracasonWednesdayevening,followed less than a minute later by a magnitude 7.5 tremor, according to the US geological Survey (USgS). the disaster struck a countryalreadygrapplingwith StEPPing UP its investment plans in india, US e-commerce giant Amazon has proposed to invest an additional $13 billion to expand artificial intelligence (Ai) and cloudinfrastructure in india, taking its total investment in the country to $48 billion between 2026 and 2030. in 2025, Amazon announced a $35-billion investmentacrossallitsbusinessesin india. this additional $13 billion, the company said, will expand AWS data centre capacity in Mumbai and Hyderabad, givingstartups,enterprisesand government organisations access to custom Ai chips, managed Ai services, secure and reliable cloud technologies, and developer tools to innovate faster, scale further and serve customers globally. the announcement came after Amazon CEo Andy Jassy met Prime Minister narendra Modi in new Delhi thursday. Jassy highlighted the growing importance of india, where Amazon operates several businesses including e-commerce, Ai and cloud, and entertainment among others, in his »continUed on PAge 2 express news Service New Delhi, Bhopal, June 25 AS tHE Congress stepped up its attack on Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav over The Indian Express investigation on land purchases by his family and their real estate firms, national convener of the BJP’s it cell Amit Malviya, BJP state president Hemant Khandelwal and ministers of the Madhya Pradesh government dismissed the allegations as “baseless…bereftofsubstance” and “politically motivated.” However, the party is silent on the investigation’s key findings that the Yadav family’s land holdings doubled between 2021 and 2023, when Mohan Yadav was a Minister, and doubled again between 2024 and 2025 after he became Chief Minister. in a post on X thursday, Malviya said: “the entire edi- fice of allegations built around TheIndianExpressreport rests on the insinuation that Mohan Yadav or his family benefitted from privileged access to information after he became Chief Minister. But even a cursory examination of the facts exposes how baseless and bereft ofsubstance thiscampaign really is.” As “the most crucial fact,” Malviya claimed that “the land »continUed on PAge 2 Govt expands QR code-tracking to curb fake cancer drugs, vaccines Anonna dutt New Delhi, June 25 in A move to check the circulation of counterfeit medicines, the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has expanded the ambit of the ‘QR code-based track-and-trace framework’ to include all vaccines, antimicrobials, anticancer medicines and narcotic and psychotropic drugs. the ministry has notified amendments to the Drugs Rules, 1945, bringing these categories of medicines under Schedule H2, which mandates theuseofbarcodesorQuickResponse (QR) codes for product identification and verification. this means manufacturers ofallsuchmedicinesmustaffix aQRcodeeitherontheprimary packaging,oronthesecondary packaging in case of space constraints, that can identify each individualunit—therebyhelping regulators trace its journey fromthemanufacturingunitto the market. “the enhanced traceability mechanismwillfacilitateauthentication of medicines at vari- ous stages of the supply chain and enable improved tracking and verification of drug products. the measure is expected to strengthen regulatory oversight and support efforts to curb the distribution of spurious medicines in the market. it will also contribute to the nationalfightagainstAnti-Microbial Resistance (AMR) by enablingbetteridentificationand monitoring of counterfeit and substandard antimicrobial products,” the ministry said in a statement on thursday. »continUed on PAge 2 bhupendra Pandey & Shyamlal Yadav Lucknow, New Delhi, June 25 PoLiCE in Ayodhya registered an FiR thursday against eight individuals and unidentified others on a complaint alleging theft,misappropriationofcash, embezzlement of funds and valuables donated to the Ram temple. the FiR was lodged at Kotwali Ramjanmabhoomi police station on a complaint by Krishna Mohan, a member of the Shri Ram Janmbhoomi teerth Kshetra trust, two days after a Special investigation team (Sit), probing the allegations,submitteditspreliminary findingstotheUPgovernment. the eight individuals named in the FiR are Avinash Shukla, Lavkush Mishra, Anukalp Mishra, Manish Kumar Yadav, Karunesh Pandey, RamashankarMishra,Ram Shankar Yadav alias tinnu Yadav and Subhash Srivastav. Late thursday, all eight were brought to the police station for questioning. Mostwere involvedinthedonationcounting work. The building which houses the counting centre. ShYAMLAL YAdAv lTheroleoftheeight SUbHASH SriVAStAV: A retired bank employee, he was in-charge of the donation counting shifts at the Pilgrim Facility Centre. rAm SHAnkAr YAdAV AliAS tinnU YAdAV: Ex-driver of Trust general secretary Champat Rai, looked after temple functioning. coUnting StAff: Avinash Shukla, Lavkush Mishra, Anukalp Mishra, Manish Kumar Yadav, Karunesh Pandey, Ramashankar Mishra. tinnu Yadav used to work as a driver for Champat Rai, »continUed on PAge 2 NCERT’s new Social Science textbook for Class 9 has SIR, more details on Emergency Abhinaya Harigovind New Delhi, June 25 AYEARaftertheElectionCommission (EC) ordered a Special intensiveRevision(SiR)ofelectoralrolls,startingwithBiharas Assembly elections were due there, the exercise has found a mention in the nCERt’s new Social Science textbook for Class 9. through SiR, the EC “ensuresthatnoeligiblecitizen is left out and no ineligible person is included in the electoral roll,” it says. the book — ‘Understanding Society india and Beyond: Part 1’ — released thursday, also features a section on the Emergency,as partof thetopic, ‘Challengestodemocraticpracticesinindia’,inachaptertitled ‘Democracy’. “one of the major challenges to democracy in india was recorded when an Emergencywasimposedin1975-77.in business as usual By EP UNNY the early 1970s, public dissatisfaction with the government led by indira gandhi was growing. Rising unemployment, inflation, and allegations of misgovernance led to widespread protests,” it says. “in June 1975, a national »continUed on PAge 2 l among measures ProPosed were an sos Phone numBer, gPs amBulances, good samarITan law and a Trauma regIsTry Saving lives on road: SC told states to put in 5 key measures, hardly any state did page 1 anchor l Two-ThirdsofdeaThsin8sTaTesalone dheeraj mishra State New Delhi, June 25 inDiA’S DiSMAL road safety record of 1.77 lakh fatalities a year has a revealing backstory. not a single state has a complete trauma care architecture the Supreme Court sought for saving lives, according to data submitted to it by 34 states and Union territories over the last nine months. A common emergency phone number, gPS-equipped ambulances, a good Samaritan law, a trauma registry and a res- uttar Pradesh Road good Ambulance: 112 NERS Trauma deaths Samaritan Public gPS Integration Registry (2024) grievance dashboard 24,118 Partial No No Yes Tamil Nadu 18,449 Partial NA Yes Yes Maharashtra 15,715 Partial Yes Yes No Madhya Pradesh 14,791 Partial No Yes No Karnataka 12,390 NA Yes No No Rajasthan 11,790 Partial No No No bihar 9,347 Partial No No No No NA No No Andhra Pradesh 8,346 cueprotocol—thesearethefive mostimportantmeasuresofthe total nine the Supreme Court had asked states to put in place in its May 26 order. these five measures form a Total deaths 1,77,175 Total deaths in top 8 states 1,14,946 (65%) l Most of the states did not provide gPS device data on private ambulances l only 1 of 8 states has linked gPS dashboard with 112 NERS l Except Karnataka, seven states have their own rescue protocol SouRCE: STATES’S SubMISSIoNS IN SuPREME CouRT crucialframeworktopreparefor the“goldenHour”—thefirst60 minutesafteranaccidentcritical to saving lives. the top court’s order came in a petition filed by SaveLiFE Foundation,aDelhi-basedroad safety organisation, which had recommended a uniform trauma care system across states. Acomprehensivereadingof the 1,200 pages of court submissions shows that of the eight states — Uttar Pradesh, tamil nadu, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Bihar and Andhra Pradesh—thataccountfortwo out of every three accident deathsinthecountry,sevenare yet to merge all their emergency numbers into 112; one »continUed on PAge 8 Why states are dragging their feet in establishing a trauma system dheeraj mishra New Delhi, June 25 PooR CooRDinAtion amongagencies,multiplicityof departments and missing standard operating procedures (SoPs) are some of the key reasons why states have not built a trauma response system as directed by the Supreme Court. A road fatality involves at least six departments viz., po- lice, health, road agency, district magistrate office, insurance company and the death registration office, which makes a quick response in emergency cases difficult. the first challenge whenever an accident happens is which number to call. there are many emergency numbers — police (100), fire (101), medical (102), ambulance (108), highway (1033), women (181), E. New Delhi cybercrime(1930),etc.A single number 112 has been conceived, but this will work only when there is a command centre at the district or state level to deploy required resources from all concerned agencies promptly during an accident. “theintegrationto112isnot just an integration of two computers. it is an integration of two different ecosystems. Currently,theAPilevel integration »continUed on PAge 8