MCS/204/2020-22 RNI No. MAHENG 2002/21899 www.INDIANExpRESS.CoM Leading Ladies The road to India’s historic win at the Women’s World Cup was paved with disappointments and heartbreaks but skipper Harmanpreet Kaur and vice captain Smriti Mandhana stayed the course. Here’s their story mumBai, novemBer 9, 2025 lAtE CIty 14 + 4 pAGES `6.00 D A I l y BooKs With the Booker prize due tomorrow, a look at some of the shortlisted novels f R o M : A H M E D A b A D , Happening today lPrime minister narendra modi is scheduled to visit Dehradun and participate in a programme marking the silver jubilee of the formation of Uttarakhand. He will also launch a commemorative postal stamp on the occasion. 09/11/2025 99 127 157 84 nation PaGe 6 Winter session of Parliament from Dec 1 to 19 C H A N D I G A R H , D E l H I , j A I p U R , K o l K A t A , l U C K N o w , M U M b A I , N A G p U R , p U N E , v A D o D A R A 44-acre mahar Land controVersY In June, Pune official sought land eviction at Pawar son firm behest FIR says firm’s application seeking land possession, Tehsildar’s order to Botanical Survey to vacate it ‘illegal’ soham shah & alok deshpande Pune, Mumbai, November 8 JUst FiVe months ago, the PuneCity tehsildaraskedCentral government undertaking Botanical survey of india (Bsi) to vacate 17.51 hectares or 44 acres of land in mundhwa leased to it by the state after a firm 99% owned by Deputy Chief minister Ajit Pawar’s son informed his office that it had purchased the land. “We received a letter a few months back asking us to vacate the land. After receiving the letter, we approached the Pune Collector. he told us verbally that we need not worry and that he would look into the matter and do the needful,” Dr A. Benniamin, a scientist and head of Bsi Pune, told The Indian Express. When contacted, Pune Collector JitendraDudiconfirmed receipt of the Bsi complaint, and said while his office was aware of the eviction notice served on Bsi, it was not aware that a sale deed had already been entered into. thesaledeedwassignedon may 19, 2025, between sheetal tejvani, who held the power of attorney on behalf of 272 originalownersofthe17.51hectares watan land belonging to the mahar (now scheduled Caste) community and a limited liability partnership firm owned by Ajit Pawar’ssonParth Pawar andDigvijayPatil.Priortoindependence, villages in the state the land in pune’s mundhwa which is at the centre of a probe ordered by maharashtra cm devendra Fadnavis; it was sold to a firm co-owned by deputy cm ajit pawar’s son parth pawar (below). pAvAN KHENGRE followed the watan system under which specific castes or families received land or revenue rights instead of cash for certain services. in fact, in a First informationreportfiledbyPune’sKhadak Police station, City tehsil- dar suryakant yevale wrote on June 9, 2025, to an ‘assistant director in the deputy director’s office’ saying the 17.51 hectares land should be vacated. the Fir does not mention to which department yevale wrote, but Ease of living and business possible only when there’s ease of justice: PM »continUed on PaGe 2 FULL REPORT ON WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM In the wings, Lalu strikes new notes: ‘Jobs priority, no reachout to Nitish’ prime minister narendra modi greets veteran BJp leader lal Krishna advani on his 98th birthday, in new delhi, saturday. x/@NARENDRAMoDI ananthakrishnan G New Delhi, November 8 Defensive in face of NDA campaign revolving around his ‘jungle raj,’ RJD chief distances himself from his past neerja chowdhury Patna, November 8 As the Bihar election campaign enters its homestretch, the verdict in less than a week, Lalu Prasad, the ageing rJD patriarch,hasremainedlargely in the wings as son tejashwi takes centrestage in his bid to defeat the nitish Kumar-led nDA government. Lalu, who has been ailing, doesnotlookhisusualbuoyant self. if anything, he looks grim andrestless,ashemeetsTheIndianExpress,sittingonthesolitary chair in the verandah at Patna’s 10, Circular road, the officialresidenceofhiswife,the rJD’s Leader of opposition in the Legislative Council, and former chief minister rabri Devi. Lalu strikes a different note when asked what the focus of themahagathbandhangovernment would be if it came to power. “Is baar hum berozgari ko dur karenge (this time, we will rid the state of unemployment)… We are going to form the government — and we p A t N A , Triservices Synergy the army’s southern command participates in a series of drills aimed at enhancing synergy, inter-operability and combat preparedness of the three services, as part of the ongoing exercise trishul along the western border on saturday. ANI rJd chief Lalu Prasad decision 2025 Bihar reP0rts, PaGe 8 are going to remove nitish Kumar.” onthepossibilityofanother tie-up with the JD(U) in case thenumbersdon’taddup,Lalu is categorical. “Ab hum nitish Kumar ko sweekar nahin karenge(Wewill not accept nitish Kumar again)…We are not in contact with nitish.” »continUed on PaGe 2 Prime minister narendra modi said saturday that ease of living and ease of business are possible only when ease of justice is ensured. speaking at the national Conference on strengthening Legal Aid Delivery mechanisms,organisedbythenational Legal services Authority (nALsA) to mark the Legal services Day, modi said, “ease of DoingBusinessandeaseofLivingaretrulypossibleonlywhen ease of Justice is also ensured. in recent years, several steps have been taken to enhance ease of Justice and going forward, we will accelerate efforts in this direction.” Underlining the significance of legal aid, he said the “language of justice should be that which can be understood by those receiving it”. this, he said, must be considered at the time of drafting laws. Pointing to the need for judgments and legal documents to be made available in local languages, he said that when people comprehend the law in their own language, it will lead to better compliance and reduce litigation. “When justice is accessible »continUed on PaGe 2 Kejriwal row has an address familiar Redeployment to surveillance: Army to Punjab: Bungalow 50, Chandigarh prepares for sixth winter in Ladakh Kanchan Vasdev amrita nayak dutta Chandigarh, November 8 New Delhi, November 8 ACCorDing to the BJP, Bungalow no. 50 of the Punjab government, in Chandigarh’s sector2,isAamAadmiParty(AAP) national convenor Arvind Kejriwal’s new ‘sheesh mahal’. With that, another lore has been added to a residence spread over two acres, located a stone’s throw away from the Punjab Chief minister’s residence, that has long been morethanjustanaddressinthe state, and often at the the Army’s plans for the harsh winterineasternLadakh include redeployment of troops along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) — it may involve temporary reduction of soldiers in the higher reaches isolatedby snow — with adequate reserves in depth areas, completion of the geo-tagging of key features along the LAC and strengthening of the surveillance infrastructure. Despite disengaging from outside Bungalow no. 50 in sector 2, chandigarh. ExpRESS heart of its political ups and downs. the opposition says that Kejriwal, who has been coming to Punjab frequently since he »continUed on PaGe 2 E. ExplainEd the trust deficit Disengagement of Indian and Chinese troops in Depsang and Demchok was completed in November 2024, days after leaders of the two countries held talks in Russia’s Kazan. There was also agreement on resumption of patrols. But the trust deficit remains, as do troops on either side of LAC. the friction points along the LAC following an understandingwiththeChineseinoctober 2024, troops are yet to de-escalate from the Ladakh region. the Army continues to be heavilydeployed ineastern Ladakh, making this the sixth consecutive winter deployment in the region since 2020. Chinesetroopsalsocontinueto bedeployed in similar strength across the LAC. According to sources, the LAC has been calm and incident-free this year following a »continUed on PaGe 2 l Uttara Mahila Patrika has held a mirror to the region’s social and political churn Uttarakhand turns 25, magazine marks milestone in its women’s many journeys aiswarya raj Dehradun, November 8 When UttArAKhAnD was carved out of Uttar Pradesh on november 9, 2000, after a decades-long movement, an editorialinUttaraMahilaPatrika, a quarterly magazine, wondered what women — one of the most crucial segments of the agitation — would do now. “now that the dream of a separate Uttarakhand state has been realised, what are the women going to do? should they quietly sit at home…or should they… form a clear vision and present it as their manifesto?” it said. Asthestateobservesitssilver jubilee, Kamla Pant, one of Uttara’s editors and Uttarakhand mahila manch leaders, tells The IndianExpressfrom her Dehradun home, “We had put up a vision statement near the court complex. not one of those aims have been fulfilled. in fact, we have added more to it.” Uttara, a hindi magazine, was launched in the octoberDecember quarter of 1990. Printed in Dehradun — but produced 280 km away, in nainital — it has since then held a mirror to the region’s social and political churn. From the hills’ anti-drugs protests,theglobalreclaimthe night movement of the 1970s and early critiques of women’s commodificationin1994tothe inclusion of transwomen in publicservicecommissions,the state’s surveillance of women’s bodies through the Uniform Civil Code and raising the october1994rampurtirahacase, Uttara has cultivated informed readers since its inception. the rampur tiraha case refers to the incident when hundredsofstatehoodactivists on their way to Delhi to protest were shot at by the police at rampur tiraha in UP’s muzaf- supporters of the ‘uttarakhand separation movement’ hold a protest in delhi demanding a separate state. ARCHIvE; (right) the cover page of the magazine’s october-december 2020 issue. farnagar district. While at least six died, several others were injured. the police were also accused of sexually assaulting women protesters. in recent years, Uttara turned its gaze on the rise of communalism,somethingthat Pantsaysitsfoundersneverimagined would one day demand its attention. the resolve to start a magazine for the working-class woman started with the 1984 “nasha nahi, rozgar Do” campaign,whenwomentooktothe streets in protest against alcoholism.Pant,thenalawyer,said whenthestatehoodmovement ended, they “wanted to play a meaningful role in society”. Around that time, Pant and her friends, Uma Bhatt, sheela rajwar and Basanti Pathak, got wind of the Delhi-based women’s magazine, manushi. in Uttara’s october-December2020issue,Pathak,one of its founding editors, recalled what inspired their decision to start the magazine. “Because women’s concerns received little space in other publications, and the problems of hill women found no mention anywhere. generally, the content in women’s »continUed on PaGe 2