NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 11: Somewould say it's much ado about the idli,that humble staple of south India and thecentre of the furious debate on social me-dia after a British academic disparaged itas “boring”. And others that this is a cul-tural, “civilisational” issue and thebrouhaha is entirely in keeping with itsstatus in the annals of India's diverse cui-sine.

Either which way, the steamed rice andlentil ‘cake' -- a pan India favourite, amust-figure in most breakfast buffets,and the choice of the discerning dieter aswell as the foodie for its health quotient-- is suddenly much talked about andmuch discussed.

Paired mostly with coconut chutney,sambhar and some spicy gunpowdersoaked in ghee, the idli moved from theaccounts of thousands of Twitter users tonational and also some international me-dia outlets with several food writers andjournalists dishing up articles that ex-plored its origins and reflected the socialmedia debate.

It all began with British historian Ed-ward Anderson responding to a questionfrom food aggregator with this innocuousstatement on Twitter, “Idlis are the mostboring things in the world." And thefloodgates opened.

Author and Congress MP from Thiru-vananthapuram Shashi Tharoor termedthe professor "truly challenged" and

Twitter users, some indignant, some pas-sionate and some tongue firmly in cheek,flooded the microblogging site with vari-ations of why they like the Indian ricecakes and also why they don't.

Tharoor's son Ishaan Tharoor, a US-based columnist, said, “I think I have en-countered the most offensive take onTwitter.” “Yes, my son, there are somewho are truly challenged in this world.Civilisation is hard to acquire: the taste& refinement to appreciate idlis, enjoycricket, or watch ottamthullal is not givento every mortal. Take pity on this poorman, for he may never know what Life

can be,” tweeted the Congress MP. An-derson, whose Twitter bio states that heworks on the “politics and history of India& Britain, migration & diasporas”, didalso say his wife is from Kerala. He mayhave found the idli boring but loves “basi-cally all south Indian food”.

But idli fans were up in arms nonethe-less. The idli has found a place in the In-dian plate – and palate – because it lightson the stomach, inexpensive and tastytoo, said many food lovers, historians andcritics alike.

Terming Tharoor's tweet a “valid re-sponse” to Anderson, food historian

Pushpesh Pant said the “beautiful andperfectly balanced food” is not justhealthy but “cost-effective” too as the bat-ter can be used over several days for differ-ent dishes.

“I think idli is a beautiful and perfectlybalanced food. It has lentils, it has riceand it gives you a very interesting mix ofvegetable proteins. It is a steamed food,it doesn't take too much oil to make, also itis easy to digest. “The batter you prepareto make idli on the first day can be usedto make idli which is the softest, secondday you make dosas which are slightlyless fluffy, third day you use it for utta-pam, so this cycle continues,” Pant toldPTI.

While the basics of making a steamedrice cake remain the same -- rice flour,urad dal (black gram) and a fermentingagent -- several versions of the idli areavailable in India's south.

If in some parts of Karnataka the flatsaucer-shaped ‘thatte idli' is preferred, inothers ‘muday idli' steamed after beingwrapped in pine or coconut palm leaveshas foodies salivating.

Apart from the most commonly avail-able plain idli and sambar from TamilNadu and Kerala, the coastal state of Goahas the ‘sanna', a savoury steamed ricecake shaped like a hockey puck. The un-likely combination of idli with chicken ormutton curry can be found in AndhraPradesh.

All about an idli: British prof's tweet sparks not so ‘boring' debate

NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 11:Trains running on identified routesat a speed of 130 kmph or above onthe railway network will have onlyair-conditioned coaches in thenear future as part of the Railways’plans to upgrade the network, anofficial said on Sunday.

Stressing that the ticket prices ofsuch trains will be “affordable”,railway ministry spokesperson D JNarain clarified that it should notbe misconstrued that “all non-ACcoaches will be made into ACcoaches”. Currently on mostroutes, speeds of mail/expresstrains have a ceiling of 110 kmph orlower.

Premium trains like Rajdhanis,Shatabdis and Durontos are al-lowed to operate at 120 kmph onsignificant parts of the GoldenQuadrilateral and Diagonals. Therakes for such trains are fit to op-erate at 130 kph or above, officialssaid.

“AC coaches have become a tech-nical necessity wherever the speed

of the train is going to be above 130kmph. Indian Railways is workingon a massive plan to upgrade therailway network to high speed po-tential,” Narain said.

Tracks on the Golden Quadrilat-eral and Diagonals are being up-graded to cater to speeds of 130kmph to 160 kmph. The non-ACsleeper coaches would be replacedby AC coaches only for such trainswhich will be running at 130/160kmph.

“Non-AC coaches will continueto run in trains running at 110kmph,” he said.

“It will be ensured that while theprice of tickets of modified ACcoaches remains very affordablefor the passengers, the comfort andconveniences increase manifoldand there is substantial reduction intravel time,” Narain said.

He said that a prototype of suchan AC coach is being manufacturedat Rail Coach Factory at Ka-

purthala and should be ready in afew weeks.

“Presently, an 83-berth coach isbeing designed. It is planned tohave 100 such coaches this yearand 200 next year. The coacheswill be evaluated and experiencegained from the running of thesecoaches will lead to furtherprogress,” he said. Officials saidthe new AC coaches will be eco-nomical as their tickets will bepriced between AC 3 and Sleepercoaches.

Compared to 72 berths in asleeper coach, this new AC coachwill have 83 berths, but the num-ber of berths in a coupe will remainthe same. However, there will beno extra middle berth betweenside-upper and side-lower berths.

The coaches are being re-de-signed by moving the electricalunits and removing the space re-served for storing blankets and bedsheets, since Railways will stopproviding them due to coron-avirus.

Non-AC sleeper coaches to be replaced by ACcoaches for trains running at 130/160 kmph: Rlys

NEW DELHI, OCTO-BER 11: Prime MinisterNarendra Modi on Sundaysaid that the centralSVAMITVA scheme wouldmake those living in ruralIndia ‘Atmanirbhar’, orself-reliant.

“We will make sure thatproperty cards reach everyvillage in the country,”said Modi while address-ing the nation during thelaunch of physical distrib-ution of property cardsunder the ‘Survey of Vil-lages and Mapping withImprovised Technology inVillage Areas’(SVAMITVA) scheme.

He said that propertyrecords lead to confidenceamong owners and opensup new avenues for invest-ment.

Also read: PM attacks ri-vals for opposing agri re-

forms, says middlemenpowered their politics

Modi interacts with Ya-munanagar’s mason dur-ing distribution of prop-erty cards

The Prime Minister alsosaid that the SVAMITVAScheme will strengthengram panchayats, andlead to easy managementof land in villages.

“For decades, crores offamilies in villages acrossthe country did not have ahome of their own. Today,nearly two crore poor fam-ilies in villages have gotpucca houses,” the PrimeMinister said.

Modi said that thescheme will bring about ahistorical change. “Todayyou (beneficiaries) have aright, a legal documentthat your house is yours;you own it.” “With

records of your property,getting a loan from thebank will be easier,” thePM said.

Interacting with thebeneficiaries, he enquiredwhether there were anydisputes during the de-marcation of their land,responding to which thebeneficiaries replied in thenegative.

The SVAMITVAscheme, launched by thePM in April, enables ruralmasses to use property as afinancial asset, aiming tocreate a geospatial data-base of all rural proper-ties. The Panchayati RajMinistry’s scheme aims ata pan-India cadastral sur-vey facilitated by drones,followed by the issuance ofproperty cards to thoseliving in abadi areas (in-habited rural land).

SVAMITVA scheme will make ruralpeople ‘atmanirbhar’: PM Modi

NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 11; Guru-gramMeham MLA Balraj Kundu, brotherShivraj, and two officials of a constructioncompany have been booked in a Rs 14-crore cheating case registered in Guru-gram's sector 50.

The duo, along with officials Moham-mad Hashim and VK Lamba, has beenbooked under Sections 420, 467, 468, and506 of the Indian Penal Code on the com-plaint of Parivartan Singh.

Singh has alleged that the accused hadgiven him a road construction project ofRs 75 crore in Madhya Pradesh.

"I started work on September 26, 2017,and completed about 55 per cent of theproject till September 2020. My companysent bills worth Rs 41 crore to KCC Build-con, the company owned by Kundu, butreceived payment of only Rs 27 crore. I hadurged the four to release the remaining Rs

14 crore several times, but they refused, "said Singh.

He alleged that Kundu used his statusand power to threaten him with dire conse-quences.

"A case was filed on late Saturday nightunder the IPC. A probe into the matter ison," said Surender Singh, SHO of Sector50 police station.

Meham MLA, brother bookedin Rs 14-crore cheating case

NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 11 : Con-gress leader Rahul Gandhi on Sunday at-tacked the Yogi Adityanath dispensationover the death of a Dalit woman from UttarPradesh's Hathras after being allegedlygang-raped, saying the chief minister andhis police say no one was raped becausefor them and many other Indians, she was"no one".

In a tweet, Gandhi said the shamefultruth is many Indians do not consider Dal-its, Muslims and tribals to be human.

"The CM & his police say no one wasraped because for them, and many otherIndians, she was NO ONE," the formerCongress chief tweeted.

He also tagged a media report whichasked why police were denying rape whenthe woman repeatedly reported rape.

A 19-year-old Dalit woman fromHathras was allegedly raped and attackedby four upper-caste men. She later suc-cumbed to injuries at a Delhi hospital.

The Yogi Adityanath government isfighting severe criticism for its handling of

the case, particularly after the local policeburnt the woman's body at night withoutthe family's approval. However, officialssaid the cremation was done "as per thewishes of the family".

The state government has said that somepeople were trying to foment caste ten-sions in the aftermath of the incident.Quoting an FSL (forensic science labora-tory) report, it has denied the rape charge.

CM, his police say no one wasraped because for them she was'no one': Rahul on Hathras case

BANGKOK, OCTO-BER 11: At least 17 peo-ple died early on Sundaywhen a train collided witha bus in central Thailand,officials said.

The tour bus was travel-ling with 65 passengerson board when it crossedthe railway track duringrain in Chacheongsao, 80kilometres east ofBangkok, where a trainsmashed into the vehicle.

Prathueng Yookassem,the district chief officer,

told Thailand’s PBS TVthat at least 17 peopledied and 30 were injured.

“It was raining, per-haps, the driver did notsee the train,” he said.

All of the injured werebrought to two hospitals.Police say they are investi-gating.

The bus passengerswere travelling fromSamut Prakan province toa Buddhist temple in Cha-choengsao for a merit-making ceremony.

Bus-train collision in central Thailand leaves 17 dead

NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 11:Lower fare limits decided by thegovernment for economy classseats of domestic flights on May 21would now also be applicable topremium economy class seats, theMinistry of Civil Aviation has said.

However, the upper fare limitsset by the government for economyclass seats would not be applicableon the premium economy classseats, according to a ministry or-der dated October 5 which was ac-cessed.

The Ministry of Civil Aviation(MoCA) had on May 21 placed up-per and lower limits on domesticairfares through seven bands, clas-sified on the basis of flight dura-tion, till August 24. Later, it was ex-tended till November 24.

Among the Indian domestic car-riers, only Vistara has premiumeconomy class seats in its flights.

Domestic passenger services re-sumed in India on May 25 afternearly two months of suspension

owing to the coronavirus pan-demic situation.

Modifying its May 21 order, theMoCA in its October 5 communi-cation stated, “The fares indi-cated... are not applicable for busi-ness class and premium economyclass. However, in premium econ-omy class, the lower fare bandwould be applicable.”

The ministry had on May 21 saidthat there would be seven bands ofticket pricing with lower and up-per fare limits based on flight du-ration. The first such band consistsof flights that are of less than 40minutes duration. The lower andthe upper fare limits for the firstband is Rs 2,000 and Rs 6,000, re-spectively.

The subsequent bands are forflights with durations of 40-60minutes, 60-90 minutes, 90-120minutes, 120-150 minutes, 150-180 minutes and 180-210 minutes.

The lower and upper limits forthese bands are: Rs 2,500-Rs7,500; Rs 3,000-Rs 9,000; Rs3,500-Rs 10,000; Rs 4,500-Rs13,000; Rs 5,500-Rs 15,700 andRs 6,500-Rs 18,600, respectively,the Directorate General of CivilAviation (DGCA) said.

The aviation ministry had madeit clear that each airline would sellat least 40 per cent of its tickets on aflight at prices less than the mid-point between the lower limit andupper limit.

It had imposed the fare limits tomake sure that passengers werenot charged beyond a certain limitamid the coronavirus pandemicand there was no predatory pricingamong the airlines as their finan-cial condition was bad due to thepandemic.

Lower fare limits to be applicable to premiumeconomy class seats: Aviation Ministry

12 JAMMU MONDAY OCTOBER 12, 2020 B A C K P A G E

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