CWC ENDORSES SONIA GANDHI AS PARTY CHIEF, CHASTISES LETTER WRITERS

After a marathon meeting stretching seven hours on Monday, the Congress

Working Committee backed the continuation of Sonia Gandhi as party chief and

passed a resolution expressing faith in her leadership after she asked to be

relieved in the wake of demands from some leaders for a full-time, active

president. The resolution also authorised her to make changes in the

organisation's structure to strengthen the party.

All CWC members, including former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, veterans AK

Antony and Ambika Soni and former party chief Rahul Gandhi, questioned the

timing of the letter written by some party leaders including Ghulam Nabi

Azad, Kapil Sibal, Anand Sharma, Manish Tewari and some others seeking a

full-time active president and described its leakage to the media as

unfortunate.

The unprecedented letter, signed by 23 party leaders had sought a "full time

and effective leadership" which is both "visible" and "active" in the field;

elections to the CWC; and the urgent establishment of an "institutional

leadership mechanism" to "collectively" guide the party's revival.

Among those present at the meeting were four of the 23 who signed the letter

- Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, Mukul Wasnik and Jitin Prasada.

Azad was in particular ornered at the meet, with Antony calling his letter

"cruel" and Soni questioning the letter saying the party had given Azad so

many positions.

The CWC while rejecting Sonia's offer to be relieved and her suggestion to

start the process to find a new chief attacked Azad and other signatories to

the letter with Azad offering to resign with some party leaders alluding

that signatories were influenced by the BJP.

The committee with majority lauded the leadership of Sonia Gandhi asking her

to continue and decide the future course of action.

The meeting also saw Rahul Gandhi attacking the signatories over the

letter's timing as it was sent when Sonia was hospitalised, and when the

party was troubleshooting in Rajasthan.

UNDER FIRE, DISSENTERS DIAL DOWN TO WAIT AND WATCH

Standing firm in the face of sharp attacks at the Congress Working Committee

meeting Monday, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma, Mukul Wasnik and Jitin

Prasada - the four CWC members who were among the 23 leaders to sign the

unprecedented letter written to party president Sonia Gandhi - argued

forcefully that the issues raised by them need discussion and redressal.

Soon after the meeting, at least nine of the signatories, including Sharma,

Kapil Sibal, Manish Tewari and Shashi Tharoor, met at Azad's residence.

Sharma said that "the co-signatories were keen to know about the

deliberations" and that "everybody is satisfied".

"It was a free and frank discussion (in the CWC). The document (letter) was

not available for all CWC members. There were a lot of misreadings and

misinterpretations, which led to some uncharitable comments made against us.

I demanded that it should be made available to everyone and released to the

public so that people know what the issues are," Sharma said.

Referring to the CWC e-meeting, he said: "Azad, Wasnik and I put forth our

views. The Congress president's concluding statement was most gracious,

giving a clear message of reconciliation, saying let whatever has happened

be behind us and let's be united and move forward. She said even if I was

hurt by a leak of some excerpts, these are my valued colleagues. We respect

her and this has brought it to a very amicable closure." Another signatory

said: "We need to wait and watch how this pans out."

At the CWC meeting earlier, the signatories made it clear that they were not

against Sonia or Rahul Gandhi, and pointed out there was nothing against the

two in the five-page letter, the contents of which were first reported by

The Indian Express Sunday.

LEADERS WHO WROTE LETTER 'MORE' COMMITTED THAN HIM TO CONGRESS: BJP LEADERS

The BJP on Monday took aim at Rahul Gandhi over his purported remarks that

the letter by 23 Congress leaders seeking changes in the organisation will

help the ruling party. "So obsessed is Rahul Gandhi with the BJP that he is

beginning to see Congress' veteran leaders as those working in 'collusion'

with BJP. Someone rightly said that when one's destruction is near, one

stops using his own mind," BJP general secretary Bhupender Yadav said.

The Congress has denied that Rahul Gandhi, its former president, had accused

any party leader of "colluding" with the BJP during the CWC meeting on

Monday.

Senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal, not a member of the Congress Working

Committee, had referred to the purported remarks in a tweet. The former

Union minister, however, withdrew it later saying Gandhi had told him that

he had never made such comments.

BJP's Tom Vadakkan, who was in the Congress for decades and was considered

close to the Gandhi family before he joined the saffron party last year,

said the Opposition's internal politics was being played out as a result of

their "misdeeds". "Mirror has cracked. When a mirror cracks, there is no way

to put it together. You have to throw it out," he said in a swipe at the

Congress leadership over the letter.

Vadakkan also said the commitment of the leaders, who are signatories to the

letter and include veterans like Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Ghulam Nabi Azad,

to the Congress is "definitely much more" than Rahul Gandhi.

Vadakkan claimed that the denial by the Congress that Rahul Gandhi made any

statement linking the letter's signatories to the BJP was an "afterthought".

"He (Rahul) believes if you are not with him, then you are with the BJP, not

even the Trinamool Congress or any other party," he said.

"IGNORE UNINFORMED SELF-STYLED NATIONALISTS": P CHIDAMBARAM ON J&K PACT

P Chidambaram, former Union minister and senior leader of the Congress - one

of the six national and regional parties that signed a resolution to work

for restoration of Jammu and Kashmir's special status under Articles 370 and

35A - said in a series of tweets that the signatories should stand "behind

their demand".

"The Constitution of India contains many examples of Special Provisions for

states and asymmetric distribution of power. How will the government resolve

the Naga issues if it is against making Special Provisions?" the veteran

lawyer tweeted.

Hinting at the BJP, Mr Chidambaram further urged the parties to "ignore

uninformed criticism of self-styled nationalists".

Soon after the Gupkar Declaration-II was signed Saturday, Jammu and Kashmir

BJP president Ravinder Raina had dismissed the development as political

"day-dreaming" and that restoration of Jammu and Kashmir's special status

was "next to impossible".

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

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

TRUMP GETS REPUBLICAN NOMINATION AND CLAIMS ELECTION BEING RIGGED

President Donald Trump opened his bid for a second term after securing the

Republican nomination Monday in typically combative fashion by claiming

Democrats want to "steal" the election that polls currently show him losing.

Minutes after the party completed the nomination vote confirming Trump as

the candidate on November 3, he appeared at the convention in Charlotte,

North Carolina, to deliver a rambling, often dark speech lasting close to an

hour.

From the opening words, he told Republicans to be on alert for what he

claimed was a Democratic plan to rig the contest through increased use of

mail-in voting -- a measure Democrats say is needed to protect people from

catching Covid-19 in crowded polling stations.

"They are trying to steal the election," he told party delegates. "The only

way they can take this election away from us is if this is a rigged

election."

HONG KONG RESEARCHERS REPORT FIRST DOCUMENTED CORONAVIRUS RE-INFECTION

A Hong Kong man who recovered from COVID-19 was infected again

four-and-a-half months later in the first documented instance of human

re-infection, researchers at the University of Hong Kong said on Monday.

The findings indicate the disease, which has killed more than 8,00,000

people worldwide, may continue to spread amongst the global population

despite herd immunity, they said.

The 33-year-old male was cleared of COVID-19 and discharged from a hospital

in April, but tested positive again after returning from Spain via Britain

on August 15.

He was found to have contracted a different coronavirus strain from the one

he had previously contracted and remained asymptomatic for the second

infection.

World Health Organisation (WHO) epidemiologist Maria Van Kerkhove said on

Monday that there was no need to jump to any conclusions in response to the

Hong Kong case.

THE REST

========

15 INJURED, AROUND 70 FEARED TRAPPED AFTER MAHARASHTRA BUILDING COLLAPSE

At least 15 people were injured and around 70 feared trapped under debris

after a multi-storey residential building in Maharashtra's Raigad district

collapsed on Monday.

There are said to be 45 flats in the five-storey building in Raigad

district's Mahad, 120 kilometres south of Mumbai.

Three rescue teams, armed with specialised equipment and sniffer dogs, have

been deployed to the scene of the accident.

EXPECT BULK OF AIR TRAFFIC BACK BY DIWALI: MINISTER

Much of the pre-Covid domestic air passenger traffic could be restored by

Diwali, Minister of State for Civil Aviation (Independent Charge) Hardeep

Singh Puri said on Monday.

"The figure (of domestic passengers) yesterday was 98,800, so we have

already reached 33% of pre-Covid numbers. We are increasing domestic

passengers at the rate of 5,000 a week. With Mumbai hopefully having Covid

numbers under control, the graph stable and coming down, I'm hoping that

after the Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations, we will open up Mumbai more;

Bengaluru, Kolkata will be a little less sporadic. We will be looking to

touch the 50% mark before too long," Puri said,

Operations are currently limited to 100 flights per day at Mumbai airport.

Flights to Kolkata from Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Nagpur, and Ahmedabad

have been restricted until August 31.

International flights, Puri said, will depend on the behaviour of the virus.

"I cannot anticipate whether countries will allow people from India in, but

we have gone ahead and made the best out of a very difficult situation,

navigated through turbulence, and today we have air bubbles with the US,

Canada, the UK, France, Germany. I have announced 13 more," he said.

"In our case, we started with a mandatory 14-day quarantine - 7 days'

institutional and 7 days' self quarantine. Now we have introduced an

innovation, if you are carrying a certificate of an RT-PCR test done in the

last 96 hours you can go through the green channel. We are opening up these

things so that we move towards normalcy."

EC SAID NO TO POLICE OVER POLL ROLLS DATA IN DELHI RIOTS PROBE

In an unusual request, the Delhi Police sought the digital electoral

database of three districts in connection with its investigation into the

Northeast Delhi riots earlier this year, but did not pursue the matter after

the Election Commission (EC) denied access and offered physical inspection

of voters' list instead.

According to a letter released by activist Saket Gokhale on Monday, the

Delhi Police sought the database in March to match the photographs of voters

with the "photographs of culprits captured through CCTV and other video

footage" available with the officers investigating the riots.

The Delhi Police had approached the state Chief Electoral Officer, and the

Commissioner Of Police, S N Shrivastava, had also written directly to the

poll panel in the first week of March.

Police sources said a similar request was also sent to the transport

department, which shared photographs from driving licences with the

investigators.

AN APOLOGY WILL BE CONTEMPT OF MY CONSCIENCE: BHUSHAN TO SC

Advocate Prashant Bhushan, who has been convicted by the Supreme Court in a

criminal contempt of court case over two tweets posted in June, and told to

tender an unconditional apology by Monday, has declined to do so.

He said the tweets "represented" a "bonafide belief that I continue to hold"

and "an apology for expression of these beliefs, conditional or

unconditional, would be insincere" and "contempt of my conscience".

In a supplementary statement Monday before the Supreme Court, filed on his

behalf by advocate Kamini Jaiswal, Bhushan said "in these troubling times,

the hopes of the people of India vest in this Court to ensure the rule of

law and the Constitution" and "not an untrammeled rule of the executive".

Bhushan was held guilty on August 14 by a bench of Justices Arun Mishra, B R

Gavai and Krishna Murari over his tweets made on June 27 and 29. On August

20, the court heard arguments on the quantum of punishment to be awarded and

said he had time until August 24 to submit an "unconditional apology, if he

so desires".

WILL CANCEL SPECTRUM ALLOCATION IF TELCOS DON'T PAY AGR DUES: SC

After several rounds of hearings and a year later, the Supreme Court has

reserved its judgment on the adjusted gross revenue (AGR) case. On the last

day of hearing on Monday, the court observed that if telecom companies are

unwilling to pay their dues, it would direct the Union government to cancel

their spectrum allocation and licence.

While the court's verdict on the tenure of paying AGR dues is expected to

decide the future of Vodafone Idea, its ruling on spectrum held by telcos

under insolvency will be critical for the telecom industry, analysts said.

The judgement on the aspect of additional liabilities, if any, will

determine the payout for Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel for past dues of

Reliance Communications, Videocon and Aircel. Reliance Jio had spectrum

sharing and trading pacts with RCom and Airtel with Videocon as well as

Aircel.

SONU SOOD OFFERS ACCOMMODATION TO 20,000 MIGRANT WORKERS

Actor Sonu Sood on Monday announced that he is offering accommodation to

20,000 migrant workers in Noida.

The actor, who was in the national spotlight for his work in helping

migrants reach their homes amid the coronavirus pandemic, shared the news on

Instagram.

Sood, 47, also said these workers have also been provided jobs in garment

factories of the region through their initiative Pravasi Rojgar. "I am

delighted to now offer accommodation for 20,000 migrated workers who have

also been provided jobs in garment units in #Noida through #PravasiRojgar.

Sood recently launched an app to offer support to workers in finding job

opportunities in various sectors across the country.

COUNTRY'S LONGEST 'ROPEWAY OVER A RIVER' INAUGURATED IN GUWAHATI

The Assam government on Monday inaugurated a 1.8-km-long ropeway over the

Brahmaputra, connecting Guwahati to North Guwahati. Officials have said that

it is the longest ropeway on a river in India.

Built at a cost of Rs 56 crore, it comprises of two cabins, each with a

capacity of 30 passengers and one operator. It takes eight minutes to

traverse the entire length of the ropeway. "This is one of the most advanced

& longest river crossing Aerial Tramway systems in India," said senior Assam

minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, who inaugurated the ropeway.

"With the blessings of Umananda, we dedicate the ropeway between Guwahati

and North Guwahati to the people of Assam. Apart from substantially reducing

travel time, the ropeway will provide a breathtaking view of the mighty

Brahmaputra and promote tourism in the State," Chief Minister Sarbananda

Sonowal said in a tweet.

GLOBAL TEAM OF SCIENTISTS DISCOVERS ONE OF THE EARLIEST GALAXIES USING

INDIA'S ASTROSAT

In a major breakthrough, a global team led by scientists of the Inter

University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) has discovered one

of the earliest galaxies in extreme ultraviolet light. AstroSat, India's

first multi-wavelength satellite that has five unique X-ray and ultraviolet

telescopes working in tandem, has detected extreme UV light from a galaxy

called AUDFs01, 9.3 billion light-years away from Earth.

The discovery was made by an international team of astronomers led by Dr

Kanak Saha, associate professor of astronomy at IUCAA, and was published on

August 24 by Nature Astronomy. The team comprises scientists from India,

Switzerland, France, USA, Japan and Netherlands.

These observations lasted for more than 28 hours in October 2016. But it

took nearly two years since then to carefully analyse the data to ascertain

that the emission is indeed from the galaxy. This is a very important clue

to how the dark ages of the Universe ended and there was light in the

Universe, said Dr Somak Raychaudhury, director of IUCAA. "We need to know

when this started, but it has been very hard to find the earliest sources of

light," Dr. Saha said.

FLAT BUYERS ENTITLED TO COMPENSATION FOR DELAYED POSSESSION, LACK OF ASSURED

AMENITIES: SC

The Supreme Court on Monday held that the flat buyers are entitled to

compensation for "delayed handing over of possession" and for the failure of

the developer to fulfil their promises with regard to amenities.

The top court set aside the verdict of the National Consumer Disputes

Redressal Commission (NCDRC) which, on July 2, 2019, had dismissed the

complaints of 339 flat buyers by holding that they were not entitled to the

compensation in excess of what was stipulated in their flat purchase

agreements for delayed possession and the lack of assured amenities.

The purchasers had booked residential flats with DLF Southern Homes Pvt Ltd,

now known as Begur OMR Homes Pvt. Ltd, in a project called Westend Heights

at New Town, DLF, BTM Extension at Begu, Bengaluru.

They had moved the NCDRC seeking compensation on account of delay in handing

over possession of the flats, reimbursement of taxes and interest charged to

the flat purchasers under the agreement , deficiency in providing amenities,

levy of electricity charges by the developer and failure to construct the

club house.

INDICATORS

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/US$

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Silver (Rs. Per KG) 67,120

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

Life is short, but there is always time enough for courtesy. - Ralph Waldo

Emerson

OFF TRACK

I'm very, very jealous. Sometimes I walk down the street and I see a

beautiful woman and I think to myself: "I'll bet my husband would like to

sleep with her" and I get so angry. I run right home and smack him, and say,

'How much more of this do you think I can take?'