DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PATNA, PUNE, VADODARA ● POSTAL REGN. NO. JAIPUR CITY/001/2024-26 JOURNALISM OF COURAGE TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2025, JAIPUR, LATE CITY, 16 PAGES `6.00 WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM CBC 15502/13/0028/2526 SINCE 1932 OCTOBER 6 DISCUSSIONS ACC CHIEF MOHSIN NAQVI IS PAKISTAN’S CRICKET HEAD & INTERIOR MINISTER ran TalksonLadakh They snubaway with trophy, says SKY after India Asian cricket chief from Pak hitawallasLeh Focus on India vs Pak in women’s World Cup: ‘Will bodypullsout, keep protocol in mind’ Kargilto‘follow’ Return trophy and medals, BCCI tells Naqvi, says will lodge complaint at ICC DEVENDRA PANDEY & SANDIP G MUMBAI, DUBAI, SEPT 29 ABL seeksprobeintokillings,releaseof jailed;opentotalksanytime:Centre DEEPTIMAN TIWARY LEH, SEPTEMBER 29 THEAPEXBody,Leh(ABL),which was supposed to hold informal talkswiththeCentreonTuesday followed by structured discussionsonOctober6,haspulledout of both, citing the current situation in Ladakh and a “negative” campaign against its agitation seeking Sixth Schedule status and statehood for the region. Asked about the ABL stand, KargilDemocraticAlliance(KDA) member Sajjad Kargili told The IndianExpressthattheirposition “isthesame”.TheKDAisleading the agitation for Sixth Schedule andstatehoodontheKargilside. Soon after the ABL’s announcement, the Centre said it was open to talks with the ABL “TROPHY LEKE bhaag gaye woh (Theyranawaywiththetrophy).” SpeakingtoTheIndianExpress, a day after leading his team to a thrilling Asia Cup final win over Pakistan, this was how Indian skipper Suryakumar Yadav summed up the bizarre scenes that played out after the game in Dubai the previous night. According to him, the Indian playerswaitedfornearlyanhour after they refused to receive the trophy from the Pakistan board and Asian Cricket Council (ACC) chief Mohsin Naqvi, who is also VINAYAKK MOHANARANGAN AP Took decision on our own on the ground: Suryakumar hiscountry'sinteriorminister.In theend,theycelebratedwithout the trophy. “Wedidn’tclosethedoorand sit inside the dressing room. We didn’t make anyone wait for the presentation ceremony. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 GUWAHATI, SEPTEMBER 29 AFTER THE politically charged Asia Cup final, a cloud of tension now hovers over the next IndiaPakistan cricket clash — at the women’s T20 World Cup in Colombo this Sunday. Sources told The Indian Express thattheBCCIisweighing itsoptionsonthewomen'steam sticking to India's stand in the Asia Cup, of avoiding handshakes with Pakistan's players. At the funeral of Tsewang Tharchin, a Kargil veteran who was among the four killed in Leh. Deeptiman Tiwary UP: Olympian’s house partly razed for road widening, Opp targets Govt CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 RELATED REPORT PAGE 3 MAULSHREE SETH ‘If police had not opened fire, entire Ladakh would have been burnt down’ THE LADAKH administration has alleged foreign and political involvement in the recent violence inLeh,evenasApexBody,Lehhas calleditaspontaneousreactionof youth frustrated with lack of opportunitiesintheUnionTerritory. A long-time RSS and BJP leader from Jammu, who served as Deputy Chief Minister of Jammu andKashmirwhenLadakhwasa part of the erstwhile state, KavinderGuptawasappointedas Lieutenant Governor of Ladakh BUSINESS AS USUAL BY UNNY LUCKNOW, SEPTEMBER 29 KARUR STAMPEDE: TVK LEADER HELD LEH, SEPTEMBER 29 THE EXPRESS INTERVIEW KAVINDER GUPTA A poster of those killed in Saturday’s stampede at TVK chief Vijay’s rally in Karur. Reuters TVK DISTRICT secretary Mathiyalagan was arrested by the police on Monday HE WAS among 3 TVK leaders who have been booked for the incident that killed 41 people FIR mentionedexcesscrowd, delayedentryamongreasons leadingtotheincident. PAGE3 LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR OF LADAKH just two months ago. In an interview with The Indian Express, he speaksontheviolence,issuesconcerning Ladakh and how the CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 INSIDE TRUMP SAYS ISRAEL HAS AGREED TO HIS 20-POINT PLAN FOR GAZA P 12 ZUBEEN PROBE: ASSAM SEEKS TO INVOKE TREATY WITH SINGAPORE P 3 X TO APPEAL AGAINST HC’S DISMISSAL OF PLEA ON SAHYOG P5 CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 NO OBJECTION: WIFE and KDA through the High Powered Committee on Ladakh oranysuchplatform“atanytime” DEEPTIMAN TIWARY “ItisanICCeventsotherewillbe protocols in place, which the team will keep in mind,” a BCCI official said. AfterIndia’srefusaltoreceive the Asia Cup trophy from PakistanCricketBoardandAsian Cricket Council chief Mohsin Naqvi, and the subsequent war of wordsbetweenbothsides,the spotlight will be on the two womenskippers—Harmanpreet Kaur and Fatima Sana — when theywalkoutforthetossattheR Premadasa Stadium. “Weshouldcallourwomen’s India to build two cross-border rail links to Bhutan, will cost `4,000 cr THE TWO NEW RAIL LINES DHEERAJ MISHRA NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 29 THE CENTRE will build two cross-border railway projects connectingBhutanwiththebordering areas of Assam and West Bengal, its first rail link with the Himalayan nation that is expected to boost ties and trade, Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said Monday. The two projects — a 69-km line connecting Kokrajhar in Assam to Gelephu in Bhutan, and a 20-km line connecting Banarhat in West Bengal to SAMTSE BANARHAT BHUT BHUTAN UTAN GELEPHU INDIA IN West Beng West Bengal Bengal engal ALTAGRAM ALTAGRAM Assam Assam KOKRAJHAR KAMAKHYAGURI KAMA GURI Samtse in Bhutan — will cost Rs 3,456 crore and Rs 577 crore, respectively. Vaishnaw, at a press conference, said the projects are of CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 A DAY after Olympian hockey player Mohammed Shahid's ancestral house was partly demolished as part of a road-widening projectinVaranasi,thestategovernmentonMondaycameunder firefromOppositionparties,who termed the move as “shameful”. Shahid, who was part of the Indian team that won the gold medal in the 1980 Moscow Olympics,diedin2016attheage of 56. Shahid’s wife, Parveen, however, said she had no objection to the demolition. Saying that she had received compensation, she requested the government to construct a memorial dedicated to Shahid in the same area to “keep his memories alive”. “The house of Padma Shri Mohd Shahid was razed to the ground by the BJP government. This was not just a house but a testamentof thecountry’ssports heritage. The BJP government, which insults respected luminaries of Kashi, will not be forgiven by the people,” State Congress president Ajay Rai said in a post on X. “Itisshamefulthatthefamily of Olympian Mohd Shahid, a hockey wizard who brought glory to India, a Padma Shri and Arjuna Award winner, is pleading with folded hands in Varanasi, begging for just one day’s respite to prepare for the demolition of their home. But in the bulldozer politics of the BJP CONTINUED ON PAGE 5 Amid thaw in relations with India, Canada designates Lawrence gang as terrorist entity Move bars Canadians from giving it financial or material support MANRAJ GREWAL SHARMA CHANDIGARH, SEPTEMBER 29 THECANADIANgovernmenthas designated the Lawrence Bishnoi gang as a terrorist entity under its Criminal Code, a step thatbarsCanadiansfromproviding his gang financial support and allows for the freezing of assets,propertyseizuresandcriminal charges against the gang’s affiliates. The development comes at a time when India and Canada are in the process of mending their relations,whichwerestrainedin 2023 after Justin Trudeau, the thenCanadianPrimeMinister,alleged“potential”involvementof Indiangovernmentagentsinthe killingofCanada-basedKhalistan separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar — a charge that India rejected as “absurd” and “motivated”. On September 18, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and his Canadian counterpart Nathalie G Drouin met in Delhi and discussed a range of issues — from pro-Khalistan activities and threats, Nijjar’s killing, besidescooperationincounter-terrorism, including India’s demand that Ottawa hand over those involved in terror and separatist activities against India and criminal activities in India. AftertheNSAsmet,anIndian readout had said the two sides engaged in productive CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 REPORT FOR 2023 29% jump in crimes against STs, Manipur tops list: NCRB data MAHENDER SINGH MANRAL NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 29 CRIMES AGAINST Scheduled Tribes (STs) increased 28.8 per cent in 2023 as compared to the previous year, with a total of 12,960 cases being registered acrossthecountry,upfrom10,064 in 2022, according to the latest data released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). Manipur, which has been grappling with ethnic violence between the Meitei and Kuki-Zo communities since May 2023, emerged as the worst-affected state, accounting for 3,399 cases against STs. It had just one case registered under this category in 2022, and no case in 2021. “In crimeagainstSTs,260casesofdacoity were reported in 2023 in Manipur,1,051casesofarson,203 cases of intentional insult or intimidation with intent to humiliate,193casesof occupy/dispose of land belonging to STs,” it said. Incomparison,crimeagainst Scheduled Castes (SCs) showed amarginalincreaseof 0.4%,with a total of 57,789 cases being registeredin2023,from57,582cases CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 RELATED REPORT PAGE 5 Meet Param, ‘That Girl’ from Punjab whose single is blowing up Internet PAGE 1 ANCHOR SUANSHU KHURANA NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 29 A PLANE cuts across the sky above a maze of tin roofs and from the crumbling homes in the alleys below, a girl, in a boxy T-shirt that says ‘World Circuit’ andcamouflagecargos,stepsout with neighbourhood children and mouths a few sharp lines in crisp Malwa Punjabi. “Ve main addi na patashe jaavan phor di…/ Ankh takdi na kise nu eh ghoordi/ Meri chuppi japdi doonge shor jahi (I don’t just stand around breaking sugar candies/ My eyes don’t just look, they stare/ My silence feels like a deep noise)” go the first few lines of a hip-hop track, titled ‘That Girl’. Dropped on YouTube lastweek,thisdebutsingleraked up over 30 lakh views within six days. This song, which is blowing up the Internet right now, is by 19-year-old rapper and singer ParamjeetKaur,whogoesbythe moniker Param, and is based in Duneke, a sleepy village in Punjab’s Moga. Produced by British record producer Manni Sandhu, the track has been backed by an independent record label, named Collab Creations, shot in Mohali and madewithoutthehelpof industry heavyweights. Interestingly, the song was recorded in an Airbnb in Punjab during Sandhu's recent India visit.Hebegantoplaysomekeys and Param began layering the first verse. "We did not record this track in an expensive studio. There was no acoustic treatment... you could hear cars outside, but still, the vocals were extremely crisp. Honestly, after 15 years in the game, experiences like this only Paramjeet Kaur in her debut single titled ‘That Girl’ happen now and again. Within 10 minutes, we had the vibe of the song down," Sandhu says in a video he put out on Instagram on Monday. Sandhu took these vocals back to his studio in the UK, added some final touches and asked his friends, Dilsher Singh and Khurpal Singh, who call themselves Tru Makers, to shoot the music video. "This was simplydowntorawtalent,That'sit," adds Sandhu, who was born in West London and raised in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. What has earned Param the spotlight is not just the raw energyinhervoice,butalsoherau- Jaipur thentic tone, powerful singing and a challenge to the typical trope of a Punjabi woman singer who often sings folk or pop. In the hyper-masculine rap scene of Punjab, where women are often reduced to props in music videos, Param isn’t doing the emceeing in street vernacular — she has composed the track and issingingwithallthelungpower she can muster. “There are many women in Punjab singing pop music. But Param is quite unique because she is one of a kind. There aren’t any women rappers in Punjab rappinginPunjabi.Sheisthefirst one in the ‘Gully Boy’ space. I think she will go a long way,” saysSatvinderSinghKohli,managing director, Speed Records, the region’s biggest music company that releases over 200 songs annually and is responsible for launching musicians like HoneySinghandSatinderSartaj. In Param’s case, what makes her even more interesting is that her swagger isn’t ripped off — it is her own and is born out of a struggle to survive. Growing up in Duneke, where her mother works as house help and her father is a daily-wage labourer, Param got interested in rap when she was CONTINUED ON PAGE 2