New Delhi: The CBI on Thursday conducted searches at the premises of former finance secretary Arvind Mayaram after filing an FIR against him and a UK-based company for alleged corruption in the supply of exclusive color shift security thread for Indian bank notes, officials said.
The CBI, in its FIR, alleged that Mayaram, the UK-based company De La Rue International Ltd, and unidentified officials of the finance ministry and RBI hatched a criminal conspiracy to extend undue favor to the firm.
The agency alleged that Mayaram as finance secretary granted an “illegal” three-year extension to an “expired contract” with the company for supplying exclusive color shift security thread without taking any mandatory security clearance from the home ministry or informing the then finance minister, they said. The extension granted by Mayaram was allegedly the fourth, the FIR said. The CBI registered the FIR under IPC sections related to criminal conspiracy and cheating and provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
It was followed by searches at the Jaipur and Delhi residence of the 1978-batch retired IAS officer, days after he had joined the Bharat Jodo Yatra of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.
The agency had registered a preliminary inquiry in 2018 on a complaint from the Chief Vigilance Officer of the Department of Economic Affairs in the Ministry of Finance.
Based on its findings, the CBI has converted it into a regular case against Mayaram, now an economic advisor to Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot.
The agency, in its FIR, said that the Center had entered into a five-year agreement with De La Rue International Ltd for the supply of exclusive color shift security thread for Indian banknotes in 2004. The contract was extended four times till December 31, 2015.
The agency has alleged that the then finance minister had authorized the Reserve Bank of India to enter an exclusivity agreement with the suppliers of exclusive security features on behalf of the government of India, which was signed with De La Rue on September 4, 2004.
The agreement with the company specifically mentioned that the company had developed an exclusive India-specific green to blue color shift clear text MRT machine-readable security thread for use in Indian banknote paper as a security feature and for which the company holds exclusive manufacturing rights.
The CBI found that the company had filed for the patent in India on June 28, 2004, which was published on March 13, 2009, and was granted on June 17, 2011, which shows that at the time of the agreement, it did not have a valid patent.
“Enquiry has further revealed that De La Rue made false claims of holding patent and they did not have any patent for their color shift thread at the time of presentation in 2002 and their selection in 2004,” the CBI has alleged.
Corruption in the supply of security thread of currency notes; CBI has registered a case against Ran Finance Secretary Arvind Mayaram.
Islamabad: The price of tea in Pakistan is rising faster than gold. As Pakistan is going through an economic crisis, many are experiencing unprecedented shortages.
The price of tea has risen from Rs 1,100 to Rs 1,600 per kg in the last 15 days. A leading brand has hiked the price of 170 gm Danedar and Elaichi packs from Rs 290 to Rs 320 and Rs 350, respectively, a retailer said. The 900 and 420-gram packs are now priced at Rs 1,480 and Rs 720, respectively, from Rs 1,350 and Rs 550 respectively.
Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) Standing Committee Convenor Zeeshan Maqsood said that imports are currently in crisis and this could lead to a major shortage in March. According to reports, the price of tea will touch Rs 2,500 per kg in Ramzan if the stranded goods are not released.
New Delhi: Amazon is reportedly in talks with Times Internet to acquire video streaming platform MX Player. Sources close to the matter said that negotiations are currently underway and the terms of the agreement are yet to be finalized.
Reports indicate that the move is part of Amazon’s efforts to expand its presence in the Indian entertainment sector.
Also, two other video players, including Zee-Sony, have expressed interest in acquiring the streaming service. The platform claims that MX Player has over 150 million active users in the country.
The news comes amid growing competition in Indian OTT streaming services. Amazon already offers its Prime Video subscription service in India.
The new move comes amid widespread layoffs. The company has also taken cost-cutting measures to overcome challenges from the global recession.
New Delhi: Delhi High Court ruled in favor of Oreo in the Oreo-Fabio dispute. The Delhi High Court has restrained Parle Products Pvt Ltd from using the name Fabio/Fab!O for its chocolate biscuits filled with vanilla cream in a trademark infringement case filed by Intercontinental Great Brands for infringing the trademark of Oreo Biscuits.
A single bench of Justice C Harishankar passed the order granting interim protection to Oreo. The court also observed that Parle was required to pronounce fab-o as fa-bee-yo in its advertisements.
The two are apparently similar. The court pointed out that like the name, its contents, form and cover are also identical. The court has banned the use of this trade mark and said that the ban will not apply to the biscuits currently in the market.
In January 2020, Parle launched a range of vanilla cream filled chocolate biscuits called Fab!O. Oreo alleged that Oreo biscuits had already been launched in the market before that. The Oreo company had alleged that Parle’s other ranges of biscuits are using the name Fabio and Fab!O only for this biscuit.
Vaishnavi Venugopal Marriage Photos – Malayalam actress Vaishnavi Venugopal got married to Raghav.Archana Kavi, Noorin Sharif and Faheem Zafar, niranjana anoop, rajisha vijayan and many other celebrities attended the wedding.
The role of ‘Mottachi’ in the movie June cannot be forgotten so soon. It was the character that made actress Vaishnavi Venugopal stand out among the audience. Now the news is coming out that Vaishnavi is married. The groom is Raghav, a long-time friend of the actor. Marriage held at Kottayam. Only close relatives and friends attended the wedding.
Stars Archana Kavi, Noorin Sharif and Faheem Zafar also arrived for the wedding ceremony. Bhayanakam (2018) was Vaishnavi’s debut film directed by Jayaraj. Later, she also acted in films like June, Keshu Ee Dimna Nathan and Janaganamana.
Dehradun: Senior Congress leader and former Uttarakhand Chief Minister Harish Rawat collapsed while protesting against the Uttarakhand government in Dehradun on Friday.
He was demonstrating along with other Congress workers against police arresting and lathi-charging unemployed youth in the state.
As soon as he felt unwell, he was admitted for treatment. The doctors informed that his health condition has improved.
New Delhi: The Center has withdrawn its decision demanding that February 14, which is celebrated as a day of love, be observed as a day to hug a cow. The Central Animal Welfare Board has withdrawn its decision to observe Cow Hug Day.
After the Center released the decision requesting to observe Cow Hug Day, massive criticism and trolls were spread widely including in the social media. After this the order was withdrawn. It has been suggested to observe February 14 as ‘Cow Hug Day’ explaining that the aim is to develop compassion towards animals. The board also informed that cows are the backbone of Indian culture and local economy. In this regard, the circular issued on February 6 has been withdrawn.
Thiruvananthapuram: A huge fire broke out in a fish tank godown on MP Appan Road in Thiruvananthapuram. The fire broke out in a shop selling aquariums at DPI Junction. The fire broke out in a 2-story building. The plastic glass collection is in the godown. Residents are being evacuated from their homes after the fire broke out in three nearby houses. All potentially explosive materials are being removed from the premises. When the fire was noticed, the people who were in the nearby houses rushed out and avoided a major accident. There were no reports of casualties.
•ONE WORD: Mammootty’s performance is the only saving factor of ‘Christopher’, a disappointing film.
•STORY IDEA:
Christopher Antony is a sincere police officer who takes the law into his hands, he delivers instant justice through encounters. The story starts with the case of rape and murder, and the case will be investigated by Christopher. He and his team will find the culprits and will kill them all in a clever encounter. For taking the law in hand Christopher will be suspended and will have to face an enquiry conducted by ACP Sulekha. So ACP will be asked to give a report and she will start to conduct an investigation by digging into Christopher’s past.
•DETAILED REVIEW:
The film ‘Christopher’ is directed by B. Unnikrishnan and written by Udaykrishna. The film is produced by
B. Unnikrishnan under the production company of RD Illuminations. The movie comes with a duration of 150 Minutes and is currently running in theatres with a censor certificate of U/A.
When looking into the previous works of the writer Udaykrishna like ‘Aaraattu’ and ‘Monster’ the ultimate result was utterly disappointing so I was not having much expectations for the film ‘Christopher’. The glimpse of Christopher through the trailer and teasers was quite promising. So I went to watch the movie with zero anticipation and to be frank Mammootty could have skipped this tedious script. The previous scripts of Udaykrisha were unbearable, and when compared with the last two films the script of Christopher is much better.
I didn’t enjoy the film, for me it was disappointing. The storyline was pretty ok for a crime drama and it blended with a thriller backdrop but the poor direction and the screenplay couldn’t make me thrilled. The predictable way of storytelling, the lengthy duration, the lag in between, the regular police story cliches, and unsurprising twists and turns in the screenplay made my theatre experience a little clumsy. The police investigation movies of B. Unnikrishnan is impressive but this time his direction doesn’t rise up to the level because of the weak script. The amazing performance of Mammootty was the saving factor, his screen presence and intense acting made me sit and watch the film till the end.
The script of this film is composed of various flashback scenes, from the very beginning to the climax the film is exhibiting the flashbacks and life incidents of the protagonist. At first, it was interesting to watch, but after two or three flashbacks, the lag gradually started to appear. The scenes began to feel stretched also, and I was beginning to lose my initial interest. And from the mid-first half, the clear picture of how this movie is going to be was clearly evident. The major drawback of this film was its predictability, what is going to happen next is easily predictable. Therefore, the scene that was supposed to create thrill and excitement was passed without giving any impact. The police investigation in the movie was boring and I didn’t feel any kind of curiosity to know what was next. The actor Vinay was a good choice to do the antagonist character and he did it in his own style which was good. But the way Udaykrishna had written his character is bad. He could have been a great villain, but less screen space and fewer scenes were only given to him.
The totality of the plot was ok for a crime thriller but the components which the writer had added could have been written better. For example there are many rape and molestation scenes in the film. Showing those scenes again and again made me annoyed and found those scenes very disturbing. In the film behind every crime scene, there will be brutal rape scenes and I was wondering why Udaya Krishna can think of something different instead of portraying too many rape scenes. Next, is the police encounter scenes, to give a heroic mass appeal for the central character the hero used to kill every man who commits rape. Like I said above, in the beginning, the encounter scenes had given an impact on the character played by Mammootty but gradually the encounter scenes also started to feel like an exaggeration. Next is the flashbacks, scene after scene the movie will reveal a flashback, and unfortunately instead of giving an engaging feel the backstories were giving me a stretched and lag feel. The flashbacks will also have some links to some rape scene and it was awful and overdramatic.
In the direction of B. Unnikrishnan what I felt good about was the way he portrayed the character of Mammootty. The character Christopher looked stylish, and the attitude of a stubborn fearless cop was presented nicely by the maker Unnikrishnan. The films like Tiger, IG, Grandmaster, Villain and Kodathi Samaksham Balan Vakeel by the director Unnikrishnan have the angle of an interesting police investigation but unfortunately in the film Christopher the investigation method was not surprising. The investigation method and findings felt normal, instead of Udaykrishna or along with him if Unnikrishnan had joined for writing the script the movie could have been more thrilling and interesting. Instead of the typical Udaykrishna script something new or a change of pattern could have been seen if the hands of Unnikrishnan were there in the script. So because of the worst writing the direction of Unnikrishnan was also not that impressive, felt just ok. As a thriller film the movie is supposed to make us thrill but here the average making and the nasty script holds the movie in the same momentum. The graph of the movie never went too high to and doesn’t offer enough thrilling moments, it was just continuing with the same flow and went flat in the end.
The performance of Mammootty was good, he carried the movie on his shoulders and his screen presence helped me to finish the movie. The police mannerism he showed and the attitude of the character was perfectly acted out by Mammootty. The few punch dialogues and the action sequences also looked fine in the acting of Mammootty. The background score tuned by Justin Varghese was brilliant. The signature tune used for the character of Mammootty was superb, and the tune was passing a mass appeal for the style of Mammootty. There wasn’t any song but the background scores used in the film are noteworthy, the important scene had the backup of some nice tunes and matched the occurrences well. The cinematography of Faiz Siddik was flawless, the action sequences were beautifully shot and all the indoor scenes had good lighting methods. The dark indoor shots, the closeup frames used to capture the emotions of the actors and the drone shots looked perfect. The grading was ok but at some scenes the blue dark tone felt unmatched. For a better engaging theatre experience, the editor Manoj could have trimmed or shortened some scenes because I felt lag in many areas.
•CONCLUSION:
So overall I didn’t enjoy the film ‘Christopher’ because of the poor script and average making. The performance of Mammootty is the only saving factor which helped me to sit and watch, the movie could have been a good crime thriller if it was having a solid script. The screenplay was like a half-baked cake, thrilling scenes and engaging scenes were missing from the writing of Udaykrishna. As a thriller film, it should not be anticipatable but here from the beginning till the end can be easily predictable. If you are a fan of Mammootty, you can book the tickets for Christopher but it’s better to watch with fewer expectations.
