The Evening Wrap: Kerala landslide death toll touches 18 amid heavy downpour

Torrential rain pummelled southern and central Kerala districts throughout Saturday, triggering landslips and floods which left many dead and wreaked havoc across Pathanamthitta, Kottayam and Idukki districts. Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who chaired a review meeting in the evening, described the situation as grave and promised all-out efforts to rescue people stranded in cut-off locations. Indications are that the weather situation will not worsen, Vijayan said. Higher education institutions which were slated to function from Monday will reopen only on Wednesday, in view of the rainfall situation, it was decided at the meeting chaired by the Chief Minister. The Sabarimala pilgrimage will be avoided till Tuesday, in view of the forecast that the rain will continue till then. The National Disaster Response Force has deployed 11 teams for search, rescue and relief operations in the state. Singhu border murder: Three accused sent to police remand Three people allegedly involved in the lynching of a labourer at a farmers’ protest site near Singhu border were remanded to six days in police custody on Sunday as the Haryana Police set up two Special Investigation Teams to probe the incident. So far, four people have been arrested in connection with the gruesome killing. Narain Singh, a member of the Sikhs’ Nihang order, was arrested on Saturday from near Amritsar. Two more Nihangs, Govindpreet Singh and Bhagwant Singh from Fatehgarh Sahib, “surrendered” on the same day before the Sonipat Police in connection with the lynching. The three accused were produced before a court in Sonipat, which remanded them to six days in police custody. The police sought remand of the accused on the ground that they have to reconstruct the scene of the crime, recover weapons and clothes of the accused, besides interrogating them in detail about the entire incident. One SIT headed by IPS officer Mayank Gupta, who is the Assistant Superintendent of Police, Kharkhoda, Sonipat, will investigate the videos of the incident which were circulating on social media. The second SIT led by Deputy Superintendent of Police, Sonipat, Virender Singh will carry out the overall probe into the case. The victim’s family had earlier questioned the attackers’ claim that he committed sacrilege and demanded a high-level probe into the case. The mortal remains of the victim, Lakhbir Singh, were cremated at his native village in Punjab’s Tarn Taran district amid tight security in the presence of his family members on Saturday evening. Sarabjit Singh was the first to be arrested on Friday for the brutal killing of Lakhbir Singh. He was produced before a Sonipat court on Saturday and remanded in police custody for seven days. Hours later, Narain Singh was arrested by the Amritsar Rural police at Amarkot village in Amritsar district, police had said. He was brought to Sonipat by the Haryana Police early Sunday. Narain Singh while talking to the media before his arrest in Amritsar, was unrepentant and said that Lakhbir Singh had been “punished for sacrilege”. According to the Sonipat police earlier, Sarabjit Singh claimed that a few more people were involved in the killing. The case has sparked outrage and triggered calls for action to clear the protest sites on Delhi’s borders where farmers have been camping since last November to press for the scrapping of the Centre’s three agri laws. The Samyukt Kisan Morcha had, however, issued a statement on Friday distancing itself from the incident and said that it wanted to make it clear that “both the parties to the incident”, the Nihang group and the victim, have no relation with the Morcha. Farmer union leaders asserted on Saturday that the incident will have no impact on the agitation and said they will upgrade security by installing CCTV cameras and increasing the number of volunteers at the protest sites. The body of Lakhbir Singh was found on Friday tied to a barricade at the Singhu border with a hand chopped off and multiple wounds caused by sharp-edged weapons. Hours after the crime, Sarabjit Sigh, wearing the blue robes of the Nihang order, claimed that he had “punished” the victim for “desecrating” a Sikh holy book. Sonia’s firm stand seeks to formalise Rahul’s role Sonia Gandhi’s assertion of being a “full time, hands-on” Congress president was, perhaps, aimed at achieving two immediate objectives. First, it was a clear message to the group of 23 (G-23) leaders — the group that is seeking internal reforms and a “visible and effective leadership” — that she is still the boss. Second, and more importantly, it was meant to convey her endorsement of some of the recent decisions taken by the party that had clear imprints of Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra. Whether it was the elevation of Navjot Singh Sidhu as the Punjab Congress chief or unseating of Amarinder Singh as Punjab Chief Minister or the induction of former JNU Students Union president Kanhaiya Kumar, several decisions, which are believed to be driven by the Gandhi siblings, have come under scrutiny. “In our party, at the moment, there is no president. So, we don’t know who is taking these decisions” — senior G-23 leader Kapil Sibal’s comments at a press conference had thrown an open challenge to the Gandhis. Gandhi’s sharp rebuttal at the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting on October 16 seems to have had the desired effect. Inside the CWC, G-23 leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma reiterated their faith in her leadership and were satisfied with the concession of holding the organisational elections (a key G-23 demand); at a press conference outside, general secretary (organisation) K.C. Venugopal took on journalists who had asked in what capacity Gandhi was trying to resolve the leadership crises in Congress-ruled Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Punjab. “We will take decisions as per our party interests. The entire Congress, its rank and file, support Shri Rahul Gandhi for his commitment and dedication to fight on principles. I want to tell you one more thing. Every single decision of the party is taken by honourable Congress president, Smt. Sonia Gandhi. She is competent, capable and nobody can question her leadership,” he told reporters on Saturday. Gandhi’s statement at the CWC sought to formalise the informal arrangement: Gandhi would be central to decision-making whether or not he enjoys any formal position. In fact, on Saturday evening, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, who had been delaying if not avoiding an expansion of his Cabinet to accommodate supporters of arch rival Sachin Pilot, called on Mr. Gandhi to discuss the issue. Before this, on Thursday, Sidhu had met Gandhi to iron out his differences with Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi. And in Chhattisgarh, the former Congress chief is already playing the role of an umpire between Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and Health Minister T.S. Singh Deo in their leadership tussle. But beyond the immediate context, by deciding to elect a new party chief only by September 20 next year, the Congress and Gandhi seem to be preparing the ground for Gandhi’s eventual elevation ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. In the next 11 months, Gandhi will have enough time and space to take the party in a direction that he thinks is best suited to take on the Narendra Modi government. Liz Truss, Nick Carter to visit India; Afghanistan and Indo-Pacific top agenda British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and outgoing Chief of Defence Staff General Nick Carter will visit India this week even as the Indo-U.K. naval exercises involving the Carrier Strike Group (CSG) in the Bay of Bengal gets under way from October 21-27, and ahead of a pending visit by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, sources said here. While the strategic purpose of the visits is to discuss the U.K.’s Indo-Pacific strategy and the newly announced Australia-U.K.-U.S. (AUKUS) alliance, both sides are also expected to focus on the situation in Afghanistan, amidst the perception in Delhi that the British government had played a major role in talks with the Taliban that led to them taking control of the country. The visits, beginning October 22, are also being scheduled ahead of the upcoming Climate Change COP26 summit opening in Glasgow on October 31-November 1. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is likely to visit Italy for the G-20 summit on October 30-31, is yet to decide on his plans for COP26, said officials. Gen. Carter is expected to meet CDS Gen. Bipin Rawat and the three service chiefs. He is also likely to call on NSA Ajit Doval, who as The Hindu had earlier reported, is planning to host a regional conference on Afghanistan in November, and invitations have gone out to several countries, including China and Pakistan for it. New Delhi has been seeking space on events in Afghanistan, given the Taliban control and close links to Pakistan, and discussions with the British military leadership will focus on countering the regional terror threat and terrorism emanating from Afghanistan. Gen. Carter raised eyebrows in Delhi for comments he made in an interview on August 18, just days after the Taliban takeover of Kabul, where he called the militant group “country boys”. He claimed that the Taliban would recognise the need for an inclusive government, and would allow women to work, particularly in the fields of education, health and government. He later said not just he but “everybody had got it wrong” on Afghanistan. The comments — and his frequent meetings in Kabul, Islamabad and Doha in the last few months — had been noted by South Block, and Doval and Foreign Secretary Harsh Shringla are understood to have raised them with the U.K. officials. In addition to the role in the AUKUS alliance that will enable a fleet of nuclear propelled submarines for the Australian navy, a strategy paper for the Indo-Pacific will also be discussed in Gen. Carter’s meetings with officials, and a roundtable with strategic thinkers. Global Hunger Index | Only 3.9% children malnourished, says government The value of a key indicator used in the Global Hunger Index is ‘inflated’ as there are only 3.9% anganwadi children found to be undernourished, the Government said on Sunday. “The real time data of beneficiaries registered on the Anganwadi platform include 7.79 crore children aged between 6 months to 6 years as per real-time Poshan Tracker data [as on 16-10-2021]. Corresponding number of undernourished children reported on Poshan Tracker is 30.27 lakh which comes to only 3.9%,” according to a reply from the Ministry of Women and Child Development to a report in The Hindu, “Global Hunger Index not based on an opinion poll”, published on October 17. It said, “These beneficiaries are representative of the poorest strata of society and the low levels of undernourishment in them surely reflects that the Indian data is highly inflated due to wrong methodology.” The GHI 2021 ranked India at 101 position out of 116 countries. The index is based on four indicators — under-nourishment, wasting, stunting and under-five mortality. Of these, India’s performance is shown to deteriorate only for undernourishment, which is what the Government has challenged. According to FAO’s data, which is used in the Index, the prevalence of undernourishment in India rose from 14% in 2017-2019 to 15.3% in 2018-2020 which the Government has called exaggerated. Covid Watch: Numbers and Developments The number of reported coronavirus cases from India stood at 3,40,72,789 at the time of publishing this newsletter, with the death toll at 4,52,232. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. [logo] The Evening Wrap 17 OCTOBER 2021 [The Hindu logo] Welcome to the Evening Wrap newsletter, your guide to the day’s biggest stories with concise analysis from The Hindu. [[Arrow]Open in browser]( [[Mail icon]More newsletters]( Kerala landslide toll touches 18 amid heavy downpour Torrential rain pummelled southern and central Kerala districts throughout Saturday, [triggering landslips and floods which left many dead]( and wreaked havoc across Pathanamthitta, Kottayam and Idukki districts. Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who chaired a review meeting in the evening, described the situation as grave and promised all-out efforts to rescue people stranded in cut-off locations. Indications are that the weather situation will not worsen, Vijayan said. [An aerial view of the rain-hit Kootickal area in Kerala’s Kottayam district. Photo: Indian Navy]  Higher education institutions which were slated to function from Monday will reopen only on Wednesday, in view of the rainfall situation, it was decided at the meeting chaired by the Chief Minister. The Sabarimala pilgrimage will be avoided till Tuesday, in view of the forecast that the rain will continue till then. The National Disaster Response Force has deployed 11 teams for search, rescue and relief operations in the state. [underlineimg] Singhu border murder: Three accused sent to police remand Three people allegedly involved in the lynching of a labourer at a farmers’ protest site near Singhu border were [remanded to six days in police custody]( on Sunday as the Haryana Police set up two Special Investigation Teams to probe the incident. So far, four people have been arrested in connection with the gruesome killing. Narain Singh, a member of the Sikhs’ Nihang order, was arrested on Saturday from near Amritsar. Two more Nihangs, Govindpreet Singh and Bhagwant Singh from Fatehgarh Sahib, “surrendered” on the same day before the Sonipat Police in connection with the lynching. The three accused were produced before a court in Sonipat, which remanded them to six days in police custody. The police sought remand of the accused on the ground that they have to reconstruct the scene of the crime, recover weapons and clothes of the accused, besides interrogating them in detail about the entire incident. One SIT headed by IPS officer Mayank Gupta, who is the Assistant Superintendent of Police, Kharkhoda, Sonipat, will investigate the videos of the incident which were circulating on social media. The second SIT led by Deputy Superintendent of Police, Sonipat, Virender Singh will carry out the overall probe into the case. The victim’s family had earlier questioned the attackers’ claim that he committed sacrilege and demanded a high-level probe into the case. The mortal remains of the victim, Lakhbir Singh, were cremated at his native village in Punjab’s Tarn Taran district amid tight security in the presence of his family members on Saturday evening. Sarabjit Singh was the first to be arrested on Friday for the brutal killing of Lakhbir Singh. He was produced before a Sonipat court on Saturday and remanded in police custody for seven days. Hours later, Narain Singh was arrested by the Amritsar Rural police at Amarkot village in Amritsar district, police had said. He was brought to Sonipat by the Haryana Police early Sunday. Narain Singh while talking to the media before his arrest in Amritsar, was unrepentant and said that Lakhbir Singh had been “punished for sacrilege”. According to the Sonipat police earlier, Sarabjit Singh claimed that a few more people were involved in the killing. The case has sparked outrage and triggered calls for action to clear the protest sites on Delhi’s borders where farmers have been camping since last November to press for the scrapping of the Centre’s three agri laws. The Samyukt Kisan Morcha had, however, issued a statement on Friday distancing itself from the incident and said that it wanted to make it clear that “both the parties to the incident”, the Nihang group and the victim, have no relation with the Morcha. Farmer union leaders asserted on Saturday that the incident will have no impact on the agitation and said they will upgrade security by installing CCTV cameras and increasing the number of volunteers at the protest sites. The body of Lakhbir Singh was found on Friday tied to a barricade at the Singhu border with a hand chopped off and multiple wounds caused by sharp-edged weapons. Hours after the crime, Sarabjit Sigh, wearing the blue robes of the Nihang order, claimed that he had “punished” the victim for “desecrating” a Sikh holy book. [underlineimg] Sonia’s firm stand seeks to formalise Rahul’s role Sonia Gandhi’s assertion of being [a “full time, hands-on” Congress president]( was, perhaps, [aimed at achieving two immediate objectives](. First, it was a clear message to the group of 23 (G-23) leaders — the group that is seeking internal reforms and a “visible and effective leadership” — that she is still the boss. Second, and more importantly, it was meant to convey her endorsement of some of the recent decisions taken by the party that had clear imprints of Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra. Whether it was the elevation of Navjot Singh Sidhu as the Punjab Congress chief or unseating of Amarinder Singh as Punjab Chief Minister or the induction of former JNU Students Union president Kanhaiya Kumar, several decisions, which are believed to be driven by the Gandhi siblings, have come under scrutiny. “In our party, at the moment, there is no president. So, we don’t know who is taking these decisions” — senior G-23 leader Kapil Sibal’s comments at a press conference had thrown an open challenge to the Gandhis. Gandhi’s sharp rebuttal at the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting on October 16 seems to have had the desired effect. Inside the CWC, G-23 leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma reiterated their faith in her leadership and were satisfied with the concession of holding the organisational elections (a key G-23 demand); at a press conference outside, general secretary (organisation) K.C. Venugopal took on journalists who had asked in what capacity Gandhi was trying to resolve the leadership crises in Congress-ruled Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Punjab. “We will take decisions as per our party interests. The entire Congress, its rank and file, support Shri Rahul Gandhi for his commitment and dedication to fight on principles. I want to tell you one more thing. Every single decision of the party is taken by honourable Congress president, Smt. Sonia Gandhi. She is competent, capable and nobody can question her leadership,” he told reporters on Saturday. Gandhi’s statement at the CWC sought to formalise the informal arrangement: Gandhi would be central to decision-making whether or not he enjoys any formal position. In fact, on Saturday evening, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, who had been delaying if not avoiding an expansion of his Cabinet to accommodate supporters of arch rival Sachin Pilot, called on Mr. Gandhi to discuss the issue. Before this, on Thursday, Sidhu had met Gandhi to iron out his differences with Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi. And in Chhattisgarh, the former Congress chief is already playing the role of an umpire between Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and Health Minister T.S. Singh Deo in their leadership tussle. But beyond the immediate context, by deciding to elect a new party chief only by September 20 next year, the Congress and Gandhi seem to be preparing the ground for Gandhi’s eventual elevation ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. In the next 11 months, Gandhi will have enough time and space to take the party in a direction that he thinks is best suited to take on the Narendra Modi government. [underlineimg] Liz Truss, Nick Carter to visit India; Afghanistan and Indo-Pacific top agenda British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and outgoing Chief of Defence Staff General Nick Carter will [visit India this week]( even as the Indo-U.K. naval exercises involving the Carrier Strike Group (CSG) in the Bay of Bengal gets under way from October 21-27, and ahead of a pending visit by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, sources said here. While the strategic purpose of the visits is to discuss the U.K.’s Indo-Pacific strategy and the newly announced Australia-U.K.-U.S. (AUKUS) alliance, both sides are also expected to focus on the situation in Afghanistan, amidst the perception in Delhi that the British government had played a major role in talks with the Taliban that led to them taking control of the country. The visits, beginning October 22, are also being scheduled ahead of the upcoming Climate Change COP26 summit opening in Glasgow on October 31-November 1. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is likely to visit Italy for the G-20 summit on October 30-31, is yet to decide on his plans for COP26, said officials. Gen. Carter is expected to meet CDS Gen. Bipin Rawat and the three service chiefs. He is also likely to call on NSA Ajit Doval, who as The Hindu had earlier reported, is planning to host a regional conference on Afghanistan in November, and invitations have gone out to several countries, including China and Pakistan for it. New Delhi has been seeking space on events in Afghanistan, given the Taliban control and close links to Pakistan, and discussions with the British military leadership will focus on countering the regional terror threat and terrorism emanating from Afghanistan. Gen. Carter raised eyebrows in Delhi for comments he made in an interview on August 18, just days after the Taliban takeover of Kabul, where he called the militant group “country boys”. He claimed that the Taliban would recognise the need for an inclusive government, and would allow women to work, particularly in the fields of education, health and government. He later said not just he but “everybody had got it wrong” on Afghanistan. The comments — and his frequent meetings in Kabul, Islamabad and Doha in the last few months — had been noted by South Block, and Doval and Foreign Secretary Harsh Shringla are understood to have raised them with the U.K. officials. In addition to the role in the AUKUS alliance that will enable a fleet of nuclear propelled submarines for the Australian navy, a strategy paper for the Indo-Pacific will also be discussed in Gen. Carter’s meetings with officials, and a roundtable with strategic thinkers. [underlineimg] Global Hunger Index | Only 3.9% children malnourished, says government The value of a key indicator used in the [Global Hunger Index]( is ‘inflated’ as there are only 3.9% anganwadi children found to be undernourished, [the Government said]( on Sunday. “The real time data of beneficiaries registered on the Anganwadi platform include 7.79 crore children aged between 6 months to 6 years as per real-time Poshan Tracker data [as on 16-10-2021]. Corresponding number of undernourished children reported on Poshan Tracker is 30.27 lakh which comes to only 3.9%,” according to a reply from the [Ministry of Women and Child Development]( to a report in The Hindu, “[Global Hunger Index not based on an opinion poll]( published on October 17. [Photo used for representation purpose only.]  It said, “These beneficiaries are representative of the poorest strata of society and the low levels of undernourishment in them surely reflects that the Indian data is highly inflated due to wrong methodology.” The GHI 2021 ranked India at 101 position out of 116 countries. The index is based on four indicators — under-nourishment, wasting, stunting and under-five mortality. Of these, India’s performance is shown to deteriorate only for undernourishment, which is what the Government has challenged. According to FAO’s data, which is used in the Index, the prevalence of undernourishment in India rose from 14% in 2017-2019 to 15.3% in 2018-2020 which the Government has called exaggerated. [underlineimg] Covid Watch: Numbers and Developments The [number of reported coronavirus cases from India]( stood at 3,40,72,789 at the time of publishing this newsletter, with the death toll at 4,52,232. [underlineimg]  Evening Wrap will return tomorrow.  Today's Top Picks [[Sunday quiz: Easy like Sunday morning] Sunday quiz: Easy like Sunday morning]( [[Captive breeding projects pointless unless habitats are restored too] Captive breeding projects pointless unless habitats are restored too]( [[Zeolite oxygen concentrators: chemistry in three dimensions] Zeolite oxygen concentrators: chemistry in three dimensions]( [[‘An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Dominion’ review: Losing face around the world] ‘An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Dominion’ review: Losing face around the world]( Copyright @ 2021, THG PUBLISHING PVT LTD. If you are facing any trouble in viewing this newsletter, please [try here]( If you do not wish to receive such emails [go here](