DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PATNA, PUNE, VADODARA MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 2025, AHMEDABAD, LATE CITY, 18 PAGES JOURNALISM OF COURAGE DEFEAT PAKISTAN BY 7 WICKETS IN ASIA CUP CLASH ‘Nitish should continue to be CM but should consider his party’s leadership issue’ UPENDRA KUSHWAHA RASHTRIYA LOK MORCHA LEADER PAGE 13 `5.00 ● WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM SINCE 1932 UNVEILS PROJECTS WORTH `18,530 CRORE twin pitch IndiawinhandsdownoverPak, PM makeselections inahead of Assembly Assam: skipthehandshake:‘Forkinof Development, anti-infiltration Pahalgamvictims,ArmedForces’ Targets Cong: ‘It wants India’s Express solidarity... dedicate win to Armed Forces: Captain Suryakumar Yadav future to be decided by infiltrators’ SUKRITA BARUAH GUWAHATI, SEPTEMBER 14 INAUGURATING AND laying the foundation for a slew of projects worth Rs 18,530 crore in Assam on Sunday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi focused on two issues — development and “infiltration” — in his address to the people of the state, which goes to the polls next year. ThePrimeMinisterarrivedin Assam on Saturday after he visitedManipurandparticipatedin the birth centenary celebrations of legendary singer, composer andfilmmakerBhupenHazarika. At Mangaldoi in Assam's Darrang district on Sunday, he laidthefoundationstonesof var- Navjot Singh was Deputy Secretary in Department of Economic Affairs EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 14 A SENIOR Finance Ministry official was killed and his wife injuredwhenaBMWhittheirmotorcycleintheDelhiCantonment area on Sunday, police said. The victim has been identifiedasNavjotSingh,57,whowas posted as Deputy Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs under the Finance Ministry. His wife is reported to have suffered serious injuries. The BMW was being driven by a woman, identified as Gaganpreet, who was accompanied by her husband and two young children, police said. An FIR has been registered, but police did not disclose the sections. According to a police officer, Singh and his wife had gone to the Bangla Sahib Gurudwara in the morning and then stopped for lunch at Karnataka Bhavan. ThecoupleleftKarnatakaBhavan atabout1:15pmandwereheading to their home in Hari Nagar when the accident occurred. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 EXPLAINED Captain Suryakumar Yadav (right) with Shivam Dube after India defeated Pakistan in Dubai on Sunday. AP EXPRESS ATASIACUP SANDIP G DUBAI, SEPTEMBER 14 THEMATCHendedasitbegan— with no handshake. India captain Suryakumar Yadav slogswept spinner Sufiyan Muqeem to complete an utterly onesided, seven-wicket victory over SC & PRESIDENTIAL REFERENCE PAGE 14 INSIDE OPP SLAMS GOVT, SAYS MATCH INSULT TO PAHALGAM VICTIMS PAGE 11 ious projects, including the Darrang Medical College and Hospital, the Guwahati Ring Road Project, and the Kuruwa–NarengiBridgeoverthe Brahmaputra. Speaking at the event, he echoedastatementhehadmade the previous day in strife-torn Manipur — the 21st century is NortheastIndia’stimeforgrowth and development. He also said that the BJP government is CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 DAMINI NATH AS THE Finance Ministry gets ready to soon leave North Block and occupy its new offices in the Common Central Secretariat (CCS)-1 building, the Budget press, the secure facility where the annual Union Budget is printed, is set to get a makeover with modern and lighter machinery to fit within the space and structural constraints of the new complex, according to offi- cial documents and sources. The Finance Ministry has been allotted space on the ground, fourth, fifth and sixth floors of the CCS-1 building, which is a part of a three-building complex constructed under theCentralVistaredevelopment plan, according to officials of the UnionHousingandUrbanAffairs Ministry. While the Finance Ministry offices will be located on the fourth, fifth and sixth floors, the Budget press is likely to be on the ground floor. In preparation for the move, BY UNNY CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Emphasis on ● connectivity A MAJOR part of BJP’s development plank that the PM flagged was connectivity in Northeast. He promised focus on “road, rail, air, 5G internet, broadband” to make life and business smoother. DHEERAJ MISHRA BUSINESS AS USUAL Pahalgamattack.Weexpressour solidarity and we want to dedicate today’s win to the Armed Forces,” he said, speaking to the broadcaster after the win. This was the first IndiaPakistan cricket match since the the Finance Ministry floated a tender on September 2 for digital production printers with an estimated cost of Rs 10 crore. In a file noting attached with the tender document, a Finance Ministry official said that due to relocation of the Budget press, there was a need to upgrade the printing infrastructure to “meet thetime-boundandconfidential requirements” of printing Budget documents. The official noted that a decision was taken to go for a E ‘Delhi much closer now’: Aizawl on Railways’ map, some hopes & fears AIZAWL, SEPTEMBER 14 SAIRANG IN Mizoram, a green mountainous town with meandering streams, has always been quiet — until Saturday, when a crimson red train chugged through. The Sairang-Anand Vihar Rajdhani Express was the first to run in the state as Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the ambitious 51.38-km BairabiSairang rail line, linking the state capital Aizawl to the Indian CONTINUED ON PAGE 12 Class 11 student Lalhmangaihsangi and her friend aboard the Sairang-Anand Vihar Rajdhani Express. Dheeraj Mishra Constraints in new Finance office, AIM TO ‘PREVENT MASS AGITATIONS BY VESTED INTERESTS’ Budget press to go modern, lighter For SOP, Shah asks police research dept to study past protests, funding NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 14 LAW PakistaninDubaiattheAsiaCup on Sunday. He remained unconquered on 47 off 37 balls, before walking away, without shaking hands,withPakistan'splayersor their captain. The match had begun thus, with both Yadav and hisPakistancounterpartSalman Aghatakingnoinitiativetoshake hands or even greet each other at the toss. And, driving the point home, Yadav later brought up the Pahalgam terror attack and dedicated the victory to the Armed Forces. “We stand with the families of the victims of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma in Darrang, Assam. PTI EXPLAINED Senior Finance Ministry official killed, wife injured as BMW hits his bike MAHENDER SINGH MANRAL NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 14 AS A step towards preventing “massagitationsbyvestedinterests” in the future, Union Home Minister Amit Shah is learnt to have asked the Bureau of Police Research & Development (BPR&D) to prepare a standard operating procedure (SOP) after studying all post-Independence protests, especially those after 1974, to analyse the reasons, “financial aspects”, final outcomes and “behind-the-scene players” of those protests. Shah is learnt to have issued these directions at the two-day ‘National Security Strategies Conference-2025’ organised by the Intelligence Bureau in New Delhi in the last week of July. “The BPR&D has been specifically asked to analyse reasons, patterns and outcomes of those protests, including behind-thescene players,” a senior governmentofficialsaid.“Ithasbeendirected that an SOP should be formulated based on the outcome of the study to prevent mass agitations by vested interestsinthefuture,”theofficialsaid. Following Shah’s directions, the BPR&D, under the Union Ministryof HomeAffairs(MHA), is in the process of setting up a teamwhichwillcoordinatewith CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 THE WORLD ANTI-MIGRANT RALLY IN LONDON, POLICE SCUFFLE WITH PROTESTERS U.S. AND CHINA HAIL NEPAL TRANSITION AS KEY PARTIES PROTEST PAGE 15 Prenatal diagnosis finds one in four suffering from genetic anomalies PAGE 1 ANCHOR BRENDAN DABHI AHMEDABAD, SEPTEMBER 14 A 14-YEAR-LONG study on prenatal diagnosis (PND) of rare genetic disorders, conducted by a leading Ahmedabad-based instituteandfundedbytheCentral government's department of biotechnology, for over 1,700 samples from 10 states and two Union Territories has found that more than a quarter of the foetuses suffered from “genetic anomalies”, and 7.7% had “other rare genetic disorders”. The study, conducted by the FRIGE Institute of Human Genetics, Ahmedabad, from 2008 to 2022, from 12 tertiary healthcare centres and published earlier this week in the Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases, showed, that out of 1,738 prenatal cases, 752 (43.27%) foetal samples were 'Normal' and showed no signs of genetic diseases. But in 519 (29.86%) cases, the foetus was identified as a 'carrier' of the disease,whilein467(26.87%)cases, the results found that the child would be born suffering from a genetic disorder. About 75% of the samples were from Gujarat. Of the 467 cases, 406 concernedthoseof autosomalrecessive(AR)disorderwithexamples including Cystic Fibrosis, Sickle CellAnaemia,Tay-SachsDisease, andWilson'sDisease.In21cases, the sample results exhibited an autosomaldominant(AD)mode of inheritance, such as Huntington's Disease. Forty of the cases were with X-linked inheritancepatterns, examples including Haemophilia. The study only focussed on diseases with molecular or biochemical genetic aetiology and did not include cases with chromosomal abnormalitiesidentifiedthrough PND. Corresponding author of the The study was conducted by an Ahmedabad-based institute. Pic credit: FRIGE paper, Dr Harsh Sheth of the FRIGE (Foundation for Research in Genetics and Endocrinology) Institute of Human Genetics said, “Rare genetic disorders are increasingly diagnosed due to advancing genetic technology, whilst treatment for them is challenging. Especially in lowmiddle income countries like India, providing treatment that costs crores of rupees makes it a significant economic barrier to accessing life-saving treatment. Therefore, (identifying) rare disease by prenatal diagnosis is a way forward to reduce the overall burden.” According to Dr Sheth, of the 467 cases in which the foetus was found suffering from disease, roughly three/fourth were from Gujarat, in line with the sample size. Most common diseases were thalassemia, sickle cell anaemia, Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA), Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) and lysosomal storage disorders, in that order. A significant chunk of sickle cell anaemia cases came from the eastern belt of Gujarat, especiallyfromTapidistrict.Early diagnosisfacilitatedtimelymedical information and provided options for prevention, such as medical termination of pregnancy(MTP)inaffectedcasesafter genetic counselling. For all foetuses with a confirmed diag- nosis for a genetic disorder, the clinical management involved a multidisciplinary approach.The core research team included foetal medicine experts, clinical geneticists, neonatologists, and genetic counsellors. The potential natural course of the disease, available CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 HARDLOOK PRENATAL TESTING: A WINDOW TO THE FUTURE, A BURDEN OF CHOICE PAGE 4 Ahmedabad