DELHI LT GOVERNOR DISMISSES PAIR OF TEAM KEJRIWAL'S COVID-19 ORDERS

Two controversial decisions of theAAP government in Delhi on testing only

those with coronavirus symptoms and blocking hospitals for residents were

overruled by the Lieutenant Governor yesterday, in a revival of the centre

versus Arvind Kejriwal fight.

Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal overturned the Delhi government's order on

testing only those showing COVID-19 symptoms and said asymptomatic cases and

high-risk contacts of a virus patient will also be tested.

Any deviation from the testing rules of the Indian Council of Medical

Research "can result in further spread of COVID-19 in the capital," Mr

Baijal said in his order.

The Lt Gov, who is a representative of the central government in Delhi, also

overruled Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's decision to reserve hospitals run

by the Delhi govt and some private hospitals for residents of the capital

amid a surge in coronavirus cases.

Everyone will be treated in Delhi without "discrimination", Mr Baijal said

in his order, asserting that treatment "should not be denied to any patient

on grounds of being a non-resident". He referred to the Supreme Court saying

in various judgments that "Right to Health" is an integral part of "Right to

Life" in the constitution.

Kejriwal, who is unwell and will take a COVID-19 test today, said the

Lieutenant Governor's decision would create a huge problem and challenge for

the people of Delhi. "Maybe it is God's will that we should serve the people

of the entire country. We will try to arrange treatment for everybody,"

tweeted the Chief Minister, who is self-isolating at his home after a mild

fever and sore throat.

Mr Kejriwal's decision, ascribed to a committee of doctors that has

predicted a spike in the demand for beds for COVID-19 treatment, had drawn

criticism both from the ruling BJP and the Congress.

"Excellent step by LG to overrule Delhi Govt's idiotic order of not treating

patients from other states! India is ONE and we have to fight this pandemic

together!" - tweeted BJP MP Gautam Gambhir.

Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram also questioned the move in tweets,

saying: "Mr Kejriwal says Delhi hospitals are only for Delhiites. Will he

please tell us who is a Delhiite? If I live or work in Delhi, am I a

Delhiite?" The former Union Minister also wondered whether Mr Kejriwal took

legal opinion before the move.

RAJNATH FOR RESOLUTION OF LONG-PENDING BOUNDARY DISPUTE WITH CHINA

Addressing a vital political issue, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Monday

said the India-China boundary dispute is long pending we want the dispute to

be resolved 'as soon as possible'.

This is second public statement by senior government functionary on the

matter since Prime Minister Narenda Modi had raised the matter of

demarcation of the 3,488-km Line of Actual Control (LAC) at a bilateral

meeting with Xi Jinping in September 2014.

Besides this, since 2003, the special representatives of both the countries

have conducted 22 rounds of talks on the matter. The boundary between India

and China was never demarcated even during the British times, the dispute

spilled over post 1947.

Singh was speaking at a 'Maharashtra jan Samwaad' virtual rally organsied by

his party, the BJP on Monday evening.

Besides addressing the festering boundary dispute, he also made the first

public comment on the ongoing India-China tensions along the LAC in Ladakh.

"India and China military and diplomatic talks are on." The meeting on June

6 of Military commanders at Chusul-Moldo was 'positive', he said adding,

"India and China have agreed that the future border dispute resolution and

also the present tussle will be done through talks."

Rajnath Singh said under no circumstances will the government let the honour

and self-respect of the country be affected. "India's policy is that we

never try to hurt any one's honour and cannot tolerate any hurt to our own,"

he said.

Congress has been asking questions as to what is happening at the boundary,

to this Rajnath Singh said "as Defence Minister I will reply in Parliament.

I will not mislead the nation and will say everything clearly".

The nation is led by a strong person like Narendra Modi "don't try and tell

us what to do", said Rajnath Singh to Congress.

Meanwhile, social media users have been posting old tweets of Narendra Modi,

who as Chief Minister of Gujarat, had questioned the Manmohan Singh

government in 2013 during a similar stand-off with China.

NEED TO IMPLEMENT CONSENSUS REACHED BETWEEN LEADERS OF BOTH COUNTRIES, SAYS

CHINA

China on Monday said the latest military-level talks with India to resolve

the border standoff underlined the need for both sides to implement the

consensus reached between the leadership of the two countries and make sure

that "differences" do not escalate into "disputes".

China's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said that on June 6

afternoon, a meeting was held between the commanders of China and India in

Chusul Moldo region and the two sides held consultations.

"One consensus is that the two sides need to implement the two leaders'

consensus and make sure that differences do not escalate into disputes," Hua

said, apparently referring to the directions of Chinese President Xi Jinping

and Prime Minister Narendra Modi after their two informal summits, asking

the militaries of the two countries to take more confidence building

measures to maintain peace and tranquillity along the borders. "The two

sides will work to maintain peace and tranquillity along the border and

create a good atmosphere...the situation overall is stable and controllable

and the two sides are ready to engage in consultation to properly solve the

relevant issues," she added.

COVID-19 DASHBOARD - (Nos. IN INDIA / Nos. WORLDWIDE)

(Indian data from covid19india / and World Data from

worldometers.info/coronavirus/ )

Total Cases 2,65,913 (+8,440) / 71,93,988 (+1,07,980)

Total Deaths 7,473 (+266) / 4,08,628 (+2,521)

Total Recovered 1,29,096 (+5,248) / 35,35,491 (+75,519)

Active Cases 1,29,344 (+2,926) / 32,49,869 (+29,940)

Serious / Critical Cases - N.A. / 53,797 (+45)

Top impacted nations so far: (And some of India's Neighbours)

Country, Total Cases / Total Deaths / Recovered Cases / Active

Cases

1 USA 20,26,493 / 1,13,055 /

7,73,480 / 11,39,958

2 Brazil 7,10,887 / 37,312 /

3,25,602 / 3,47,973

3 Russia 4,76,658 / 5,971 /

2,30,688 / 2,39,999

4 Spain 2,88,797 / 27,136 / N/A

/ N/A

5 UK 2,87,399 / 40,597 / N/A

/ N/A

6 India 2,65,928 / 7,473 /

1,29,095 / 1,29,360

7 Italy 2,35,278 / 33,964 /

1,66,584 / 34,730

8 Peru 1,99,696 / 5,571 /

89,556 / 1,04,569

9 Germany 1,86,205 / 8,783 /

1,69,600 / 7,822

10 Iran 1,73,832 / 8,351 /

1,36,360 / 29,121

11 Turkey 1,71,121 / 4,711 /

1,41,380 / 25,030

16 Pakistan 1,03,671 / 2,067 /

34,355 / 67,249

20 Bangladesh 68,504 / 930 / 14,560

/ 53,014

99 Sri Lanka 1,857 / 11 / 990

/ 856

Top 18 impacted Indian States so far: (Total No. of Confirmed case / No. Of

Deaths)

State / Confirmed Cases / Active Case / Recovered /

Deceased

Maharashtra 88,529 / 44,385 / 40,975 /

3,169

Tamil Nadu 33,229 / 15,413 / 17,527 /

289

Delhi 29,943 / 17,712 / 11,357 / 874

Gujarat 20,574 / 5,330 / 13,964 / 1,280

Uttar Pradesh 10,947 / 4,320 / 6,344 /

283

Rajasthan 10,876 / 2,513 / 8,117 /

246

Madhya Pradesh 9,638 / 2,688 / 6,536

/ 414

West Bengal 8,613 / 4,743 / 3,465 /

405

Karnataka 5,760 / 3,175 / 2,519 /

64

Bihar 5,247 / 2,674 / 2,542 / 31

Haryana 4,854 / 3,115 / 1,700 /

39

Andhra Pradesh 4,813 / 2,018 / 2,720

/ 75

Jammu and Kashmir 4,285 / 2,916 / 1,324 /

45

Telangana 3,650 / 1,771 / 1,742 /

137

Odisha 2,994 / 990 / 1,993 / 11

Assam 2,836 / 2,044 / 785 / 4

Punjab 2,663 / 482 / 2,128 / 53

Kerala 2,006 / 1,175 / 814 / 17

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

======================

COVID-19 VIRUS SPREAD FROM ASYMPTOMATIC PATIENTS RARE: WHO

The head of the World Health Organization warned that the coronavirus

pandemic is worsening globally, even as the situation in Europe is

improving. At a press briefing on Monday, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus noted

that about 75% of cases reported to the U.N. health agency on Sunday came

from 10 countries in the Americas and South Asia.

WHO Also said that still believes the spread of the coronavirus from people

without symptoms is "rare," despite warnings from numerous experts worldwide

that such transmission is more frequent and likely explains why the pandemic

has been so hard to contain.

Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO's technical lead on COVID-19 said at a press

briefing on Monday that many countries are reporting cases of spread from

people who are asymptomatic, or those with no clinical symptoms. But when

questioned in more detail about these cases, Van Kerkhove said many of them

turn out to have mild disease or unusual symptoms.

Although health officials in countries including Britain, the U.S. and

elsewhere have warned that COVID-19 is spreading from people without

symptoms, WHO has maintained that this type of spread is not a driver of the

pandemic and is probably accounts for about 6% of spread, at most. Numerous

studies have suggested that the virus is spreading from people without

symptoms, but many of those are either anecdotal reports or based on

modeling.

NORTH KOREA HALTS ALL COMMUNICATIONS WITH SOUTH IN ROW OVER LEAFLETING

North Korea has said it will cut off all inter-Korean communication lines

with the South, including a hotline between the two nation's leaders.

The North said this was the first in a series of actions, describing South

Korea as "the enemy".

Daily calls, which have been made to a liaison office located in the North

Korean border city of Kaesong, will cease from Tuesday.

The two states had set up the office to reduce tensions after talks in 2018.

CYNTHIA D RITCHIE, WHO HAS BEEN ROILING PAK'S POLITICS

It all began on Twitter, on May 28, when one Cynthia D Ritchie, an American

national who has lived in Pakistan for nearly a decade, tweeted alleging

that Benazir Bhutto would order her guards to "rape" women with whom her

husband Asif Ali Zardari had affairs.

Since then, the matter has spiralled, and drawn in more top-rungers in the

Pakistan People's Party (PPP). On Saturday, Ritchie accused former Interior

Minister Rehman Malik of raping her, and former Prime Minister Yusuf Raza

Gilani and another Cabinet Minister of groping her. Both Malik and Gilani

have denied the allegations.

The PPP, the ruling party in Sindh province, despite the massive setback in

the 2018 parliamentary election, is shaken and has demanded that the Federal

Investigation Agency (FIA) investigate Ritchie and the terms of her stay in

Pakistan for her "very derogatory and slanderous remarks" about Benazir and

Zardari.

Sherry Rehman, a PPP representative in the Senate, the upper house in

Pakistan's parliament, posted on Twitter: "I usually don't dignify such

garbage, but this is libellous, heinous slander based on malicious lies.

Attributing such filth to a champion for women's rights, a martyred prime

minister degrades the writer of this bot-handle more than anything else."

Even as Pakistan grapples with a surge in novel coronavirus infections, many

Pakistanis are finding l'affaire Cynthia Ritchie more rivetting at the

moment.

THE REST

========

COVID-19: INDIA STILL TESTING VERY LITTLE

At a time when India has ramped up its Covid-19 tests to more than a lakh

per day, data from Johns Hopkins University shows the country has the

sixth-highest average daily positivity rate of 8.73 per cent. However, the

positivity rate is leas than a fourth of Brazil, which tops the list with

36.68 per cent, even though the South American country has conducted more

Covid-19 tests than India.

Besides Brazil, India's cumulative positivity rate is lower than Mexico

(17.17 per cent), Sweden (14.67 per cent), US (13.83 per cent) and UK (13.01

per cent) as on June 7.

Test positivity rate is the percentage of tests that are turning out to be

positive for the novel coronavirus.

But the test positivity rate in major Indian cities like Delhi and Mumbai is

very high - at over 35%.

The WHO guidelines state that governments should see positivity rates below

5 per cent for at least 14 days before relaxing social distancing measures.

Moreover, India fares the worst among the top 10 affected countries when it

comes to the average daily number of tests per 100,000 population. India's

all-time average daily tests has been 1 per 100,000 population since the

outbreak and is closely followed by Mexico (2 per 100,000 population).

According to the ICMR, a total of 47,74,434 samples have been tested till 9

am on June 8, with 1,08,048 samples being tested in the last 24 hours.

CONG, RAJNATH TRADE GHALIB COUPLETS ON LAC STANDOFF

The ongoing India-China standoff along the LAC on Monday saw the opposition

Congress leaders and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh trading Urdu couplets to

make their respective points.

After Congress leader Rahul Gandhi borrowed from the legendary poet Mirza

Ghalib to take a swipe at the government on the LAC situation, saying "Sabko

maloom hai 'seema' ki haqeqat lekin, dil ko khush karne ko, 'shah-yad' yeh

khayal achha hai", Rajnath Singh retorted with another distorted Ghalib

verse.

Singh's tweet, a jibe at the Congress and its election symbol (the hand),

read, "Haath mein dard ho toh dawa keeje, haath hee jab dard ho toh kya

keeje.."

The trading of couplets didn't end here and late Monday it was the turn of

Congress media head Randeep Surjewala to rise to the defence of Rahul

Gandhi.

Surjewala's tweet, an answer to Rajnath's and a poser to Prime Minister

Narendra Modi, read, "Sawaal puchho toh sawaal puchhte hain, hukumat waale

ab zubaan pucchte hain, Kuchh baazu-e-taaqat toh aazmaaye janaab, Hum

Hindustan hain, laal aankh kaa anjaam puchhte hain."

EDITORS GUILD SLAMS FIR AGAINST JOURNALIST VINOD DUA

The Editors Guild of India on Monday termed the filing of an FIR against

senior journalist Vinod Dua as a "brazen attack" on his right to free

speech.

Delhi police on Friday said they have registered an FIR against Dua for

allegedly "making statements conducing to public mischief" on the complaint

of BJP spokesperson Naveen Kumar. In his complaint to the Crime Branch,

Kumar accused Dua of "spreading fake news" through "The Vinod Dua Show" on

YouTube.

Dua was also accused by Kumar of "misreporting" on the Delhi communal

violence and stating that the "central government had done nothing to stop

the violence". Kumar has alleged that Dua had called the prime minister

"toothless".

In its statement, the Editors Guild said it is deeply concerned by the

growing tendency among police in various states to take cognisance of

frivolous charges against journalists and convert them into a FIR. An FIR

based on this is an instrument of harassment setting off a process that is

itself a punishment, the Guild said.

PRIVATE HOSPITALS OFFER REMOTE MONITORING, CARE AT HOME FOR COVID-19

PATIENTS

A number of private hospitals in various cities have begun care packages for

coronavirus disease (Covid-19) patients who are in home isolation, offering

remote monitoring by nurses and doctors and medical care kits that will help

detect if their condition deteriorates.

Medanta's (NCR) Covid-19 home care services are split into basic packages

for monitoring or more thorough 'complete covid care' offering that includes

a Covid-19 test; N-95 and other masks, gloves, sanitisers, a pulse oximeter,

a digital thermometer, a blood pressure machine, a PPE kit, as well as

vitals monitoring tools with built-in critical alert system.

Experts welcomed such offerings. "If the patient is suspected clinically but

doesn't have any breathing difficulty or pneumonia or any other

life-threatening symptoms, the patient should stay home. In fact the patient

will get more infections if he or she is in a hospital. These patients

should register with a medical facility. A nurse or doctor should be in

touch over the phone every day," said Dr Jacob John, professor emeritus and

former head of virology at Christian Medical College, Vellore.

IN A FIRST, NO PARENTS AT IMA PASSING OUT PARADE; EVENT TO BE TELECAST LIVE

One of the most cherished moments in a military officer's life is the

passing out parade (POP) from their training academy when they take the

'antim pag' or the final step from being cadets to becoming combat leaders.

This summer, however, the POP at the Indian Military Academy (IMA),

traditionally a grand and elaborate affair, would be a watered down event

due to restrictions imposed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Parents, siblings and friends of the cadets passing out would not be

present. The event has as much significance and pride for parents and

siblings as for the cadets themselves. Traditionally, it is the parents,

brothers or sisters who 'pip' the cadets - which is the pinning of the two

stars of a Lieutenant on each shoulder - to formally make them commissioned

officers.

To compensate, the Army has made elaborate arrangements for a live telecast

of the event on some TV channels and also on social media in the same manner

as is being done for the Republic Day Parade and the Army Day Parade.

GUJARAT HC ORDER STAYS E-VOTING PROCESS ON FRANKLIN MF WOUND-UP SCHEMES

Gujarat High Court on Monday rejected Franklin Templeton Mutual Fund's

appeal to vacate the stay on the e-voting process and said that the stay

would be in force till the findings of forensic audit report comes in the

public domain.

The e-voting was scheduled to be held today (June 9).

The HC order read, "It has been rightly submitted by learned senior advocate

Mr Thakore that amidst the allegation of mismanagement of funds and fraud,

the unit-holders would not be having the opportunity of informed decision

making while casting the e-votes for the option given by the applicants."

Senior counsel Mihir Thakore appeared on behalf of the original petitioners

Areez Pirozsha Khambatta and Persis Khambatta, who belong to the business

family that runs the popular juice brand Rasna. The petitioners had

investments of Rs 6.55 crore.

Later, other investors joined the plea.

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Silver (Rs. Per KG) 48,910

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

Your life is not yours if you always care what others think. - Unknown

OFF TRACK

Girl to boyfriend- "I'm pregnant"

Boyfriend - "Are you sure that its mine?"

Girl starts crying & says, "sab aisa bolenge to kaise chalegaa..!"