eye THE SUNDAY EXPRESS MAGAZINE Dressing Up the Next Gen KOLKATA,LATECITY AUGUST25,2024 India’s fashion ramp is studded with mavericks and outliers 14+4PAGES, `7.00 (`12 IN NORTH EAST STATES & ANDAMAN) WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM UNIFIED PENSION SCHEME APPROVED BY UNION CABINET Increasing its share, Centre rolls out new plan, guarantees 50% of basic salary as pension FAMILY PENSION 60% PM:Schemewill ensuredignity, financialsecurity of govtemployees AANCHAL MAGAZINE NEW DELHI, AUGUST 24 THE UNION Cabinet on Saturday approved a new Unified Pension Scheme (UPS) for Central government employees which assures them 50 per cent of their average basic After year in enclosures, Kuno cheetahs set to be freed into the wild ANAND MOHAN J BHOPAL, AUGUST 24 AFTER SPENDING a year inside enclosures, the African cheetahs brought to India as part of the world's first intercontinental translocation of the big cats are set to be released into the wild again at Kuno national park. The cheetahs were brought to the enclosures on August 13, 2023 after three adult cheetahs “died due to septicaemia after wounds beneath their dense wintercoatonthebackandneck regions became infested with maggots” in July. It was a major setbacktothetranslocationproject, which began in September 2022. Headof theCheetahSteering Committee, Dr Rajesh Gopal, told The Indian Express the cheetahs will be released in a phased CONTINUED ON PAGE 6 MINIMUM PENSION AANCHAL MAGAZINE `10,000/ mth if tenure less NEW DELHI, AUGUST 24 INFLATION INDEXATION WITH YOUNG government employees staring at the prospects of lower than 50% salary as pension, the Centre has now tweaked its existing scheme with a new Unified Pension ASSURED PENSION 50 % of avg basic pay in 12 mths before superannuation of pension drawn by employee before death PM NarendraModiwithadelegationfromthestaff sideof the JointConsultativeMachineryforcentralemployeesinDelhi. ANI pay drawn over the last 12 months prior to retirement as pension. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 TWO KEY SCIENCE INITIATIVES GET CABINET NOD PAGE 8 Onassuredpension,family pension,minimumpension LUMP-SUM PAYMENT In addition to gratuity SHUBHAJIT ROY NAGAON, AUGUST 24 THEMANarrestedinconnection with the gang rape of a teenage girl in Assam’s Nagaon district died on Saturday, with police claiming he had jumped into a pond in an escape bid when he wastakentothecrimescenelate at night. Tafazul Islam (24), who was arrested on Friday, was one of threeaccusedintherapeof a14year-old, who was returning home from tuition classes on Thursday evening. Two others are absconding. Police claim that following his interrogation, Islam was taken to the crime scene around 3 am on Saturday, when he jumped into a pond while still handcuffed. "We cordoned the area and called the State Disaster Relief Force,whichrecoveredthebody. Aconstablewhowasholdinghis NEW DELHI, AUGUST 24 Local residents protest the alleged rape of a girl in Assam’s Nagaon, Friday. PTI handcuffs suffered an injury to his hand," Superintendent of Police, Nagaon, Swapnaneel Deka said. When The Indian Express asked why the accused was taken to the crime scene at that hour,Dekasaidthiswasbecause the town had been “paralysed” by protests through all of Friday. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 SAGAR RAJPUT MUMBAI, AUGUST 24 Laxmi Building at Cotton Green in Mumbai. Sankhadeep Banerjee Police,” the sign in yellow and white lettering, displayed prominently on the threestoreyed Laxmi Building, announces loudly. “It should be noted that legal action will be taken if anyone encroaches on the said flats.” Installed by the Mumbai Police this March, the signboard is an outcome of a legal wrangle between the department and the family of a 76-year-old CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 WHEN INDIAN High Commissioner Pranay Verma met Chief Advisor in the interim government Prof Muhammad Yunus in Dhaka this Thursday, one of the key issues he flagged was the security of Indian diplomatic personnel and their premises. This included the violent attack and arson at the Indira Gandhi Cultural Centre (IGCC), the hub of Indian cultural activity in the CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Jet engines to munitions: India, US to speed up co-production US govt notifies Congress on sale of anti-submarine sonobuoys to India CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Indira Gandhi Centre was hub of Indian art, music, dance SUKRITA BARUAH RAJNATH HOLDS TALKS Scheme(UPS).A defined assured pension, family pension and a minimum pension for those with less than the mandatory serviceforfullpensionareitskey features. Assam rape accused MOB VANDALISED CENTRE, SET IT ABLAZE dies in custody, cops Delhi flags to Dhaka: Mob violence say jumped into pond at India culture centre on Aug 5-6 In Mumbai, police, family caught in wrangle over 82-year-old building JUST PAST the restaurants and shops of the busy Zakaria Bunder Road in Mumbai’s Cotton Green, a peculiar neonblue signboard catches the eye. “In this building, 46 flats such as room numbers 1-16 on the ground floor, 18-32 on the first floor, 34-48 on the second floor are in possession of the Mumbai In UPS, extra burden, but no pushing back of the reform needle UPS: KEY FEATURES FOUR-PAGE PULLOUT After the arson at the Indira Gandhi Cultural Centre, run by the ICCR, in Dhaka. Shubhajit Roy Defence Minister Rajnath Singh with representatives of leading US defence companies in Washington. PTI AMRITA NAYAK DUTTA NEW DELHI, AUGUST 24 MOVING TO deepen their defence ties, India and the United States have agreed to advance priority co-production projects, includingjetengines,unmanned platforms, munitions and ground mobility systems, under the US-India Roadmap for Defence Industrial Cooperation. This announcement by the Pentagon came hours after Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, whoisvisitingtheUS,heldbilateral talks with his counterpart, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J Austin, at the Pentagon Friday. The US government also approved Friday the proposed sale CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 EXPLAINED DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PUNE, VADODARA E The ties and the ● message THE PROGRESS made in defence co-production projects comes at a time when the US is headed to polls, reflecting the bipartisan consensus there on the ties with India, especially in Indo-Pacific. Incidentally, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh was holding talks in the Pentagon the day PM Modi was in Kyiv, asking President Zelenskyy to sit at the table with President Putin and find a way out of the crisis over the war. Mehbooba says will Adani, Birla keen to tap Mongolian support NC-Cong if copper, but face logistics challenge it backs ‘PDP agenda’ Govt suggests THE COPPER ROUTES NAVEED IQBAL SRINAGAR, AUGUST 24 THE PEOPLE’S Democratic Party (PDP) president and former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister, Mehbooba Mufti, said Saturday that in the upcoming J&KAssemblypollsthePDP“will extend complete electoral support to the National Conference (NC)-Congress alliance if it accepts the PDP’s pro-people agenda”. Mufti said her party would welcome an alliance “based on an agenda seeking a resolution of theKashmirissue”,butnotfor elections and seat-sharing arrangements. She made these statements PDP chief and ex-CM Mehbooba Mufti while releasing the PDP’s poll manifestoatthepartyheadquarters in Srinagar. Significantly, the Congress and the NC announced their alliance for all 90 Assembly seats in J&K on Thursday, when Congress president Mallikarjun CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 JAMAAT SET TO FIELD EX- MEMBERS AS INDEPENDENTS P8 visit, trial order to understand trade dynamics RUSSIA Ulaanbaatar MONGOLIA Umnugovi AGGAM WALIA NEW DELHI, AUGUST 24 TWO LARGE companies Adani Enterprises Ltd and Aditya Birla group-ownedHindalcoIndustries Ltd are keen to source raw material from copper-rich Mongolia, butareconcernedaboutthelogistics of transporting copper concentrate from the landlocked Central Asian country to India. Copper concentrates is a key inputforrefinedcopper,andIndia relies on imports for nearly 90 per cent of its supply due to lim- CHINA Beijing Tianjin port Vladivostok Sea Of Japan Yellow Sea AT PRESENT, there are only two options for shipments out of Mongolia – by rail to China’s Tianjin port or a combined road and rail route to Vladivostok, Russia ited domestic mining of thiscritical mineral. India imports its requirementsalmostentirelyfrom Indonesia, Chile and Australia. Mongolia exported copper ore worth $2.7 billion in 2022 and was the world’s 10th largest exporter of the commodity. Much of its exports go exclusively to China. In a meeting in New Delhi CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Family, friends remember R G Kar doctor: ‘Was empathetic with patients’ SWEETY KUMARI KOLKATA, AUGUST 24 SITTING ON the stairs of his three-storey house, a day after the rape and murder of his daughter, a junior doctor at the Kolkata hospital where she worked, a sobbing 62-year-old recalled how he would, at times, not have the money to buy her the pomegranates she loved when she was little. “We were not financially sound when my daughter was small. Then, my business (of Duringaprotestagainsttherapeandmurderof thetrainee doctorinKolkata. File RELATEDREPORTS,PAGE4 stitching and selling school uniforms) took off. We moved to Kolkata and built this house. The name plate outside bears only her name — because she proved everyone wrong by becoming a doctor on her own. Her mother and I were extremely proud of her. Now, we just want our only child back,” he cried. The doctor’s mother says she last spoke to her daughter at 11.15 pm on August 8. The mother told The Indian Express over telephone, “She had taken chicken for dinner that day (August 8). I called her at 8 am (on August 9) but she did not take my call. I assumed that she was busy at work. Little did I know that my daughter was dead.” A relative says the doctor got admission in Malda Medical College and Hospital in Malda district, but ended up going to the College of Medicine & JNM Hospital, in Kalyani, Nadia, since it was closer home. She got her MBBS degree in 2018, he adds. She joined R G Kar Hospital for her postgraduate training in 2022. On August 9, her body was discovered in the fourth-floor seminar hall of R G Kar, where she had allegedly been raped and murdered in the early hours of August 9. Kolkata Police have arrested Sanjay Roy, a civic volunteer at the hospital, in connection with the incident. At R G Kar, as they stand united in their demand for a thorough investigation into the circumstances surrounding her death, her colleagues recall her fondly, describing her as a “proactive, talkative and friendly colleague who never had a single argument with anyone”. Two of her colleagues say she was known for her “exceptional” counselling skills at the hospital. “Her interactions with patients were always empathetic, making her the first choice each time someone wanted to counsel a family. If a patient’s relative wanted advice or was anxious and if she was on duty, she was almost always sent to speak to them. She was a natural,” they say. Despite her demanding schedule as a resident doctor, she kept a diary, where she shared herthoughts,experiences andaspirations.“Shewasalsoactive on social media, but her accountwasdeletedafterherdeath topreventmisuseofherpersonal photos,” her colleagues say. A fellow postgraduate trainee (PGT) says he would often tease her for her beautiful handwriting. “I would often jokingly tell her that her handwriting was unbecoming of a doctor,” he recalls tearfully. The two PGTs first met in 2022. “She was the only woman CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Kolkata