YEARS # 1 Indian American Weekly : Since 2006 VOL 15 ISSUE 20 ● NEW YORK / DALLAS ● MAY 14 - MAY 20, 2021 ● ENQUIRIES: 646-247-9458 ● [email protected] www.theindianpanorama.news 12 OPPOSITION LEADERS WRITE TO PM MODI, US lifts most mask DEMANDING FREE MASS VACCINATION, guidance in key step back SUSPENSION OF CENTRAL VISTA PROJECT to post - Covid normalcy Fully vaccinated Americans can ditch their masks in most settings, even indoors or in large groups. WASHINGTON (TIP): President Joe Biden took his biggest step yet toward declaring a victory over the coronavirus pandemic - as public health officials said fully vaccinated Americans can ditch their masks in most settings, even indoors or in large groups. "Today is a great day for America in our long battle with coronavirus," Biden said in the In a joint letter to PM Modi, 12 opposition White House Rose Garden on Thursday,May 13, party leaders, including Sonia Gandhi, have demanded Central govt to provide calling the US vaccination program an foodgrains to the needy and Rs 6,000 "historical logistical achievement." monthly to the unemployed. - File photo of The guidance shift Thursday, May 13, is a Prime Minister Narendra Modi | Twitter turning point in the fight against Covid-19 and @BJP4India comes as US caseloads fall and vaccinations NEW DELHI (TIP): In a joint letter rise. It signals a broad return to everyday to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, lifeand is also a bet that any surge in spread May 12, 12 Opposition parties have from relaxed guidelines won't be enough to urged the government to immediately reverse progress in inoculations. The begin a free, universal mass administration also used it as a further vaccination campaign across the incentive for vaccination. country as the COVID-19 pandemic has "The rule is very simple: Get vaccinated or "assumed unprecedented dimensions wear a mask until you do," Biden said Vice President Kamala Harris listens as President Joe Biden speaks on updated guidance of a human catastrophe." on face mask mandates and COVID-19 response, in the Rose Garden of the White House, READ FULL STORY ON PAGE 26 CONTD ON PAGE 36 Thursday, May 13, 2021, in Washington. - Photo credit: AP Photo/Evan Vucci Nassau County, Friends For Good Health, Indian-origin workers allege ‘forced labor’ South Asian-American community Join at BAPS Hindu temple in New Jersey together to Appeal for Aid to India NEW JERSEY(TIP): Six former workers have accused operators of a I.S.SALUJA major Hindu temple in Robbinsville, LONG ISLAND, NY New Jersey, of trafficking hundreds of (TIP): Nassau County Indian laborers, camouflaged as officials and Friends For religious volunteers while keeping them Good Health, on May 10, locked down in the very temple they joined together with the were building. South Asian-American The workers filed a federal civil community, civic, and lawsuit Tuesday, May 11, against religious leaders to Bochasanwasi Shri Akshar The lawsuit against Bochasanwasi Shri announce a major aid Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha Akshar Purushottam (BAPS) Swaminarayan campaign to help India Nassau County officials and Friends For Good Health, on May Inc., (BAPS) a Hindu religious Sanstha Inc., a Hindu religious organization which is facing an 10, joined together with the South Asian-American organization, and several business has been filed by Mukesh Kumar, Keshav unprecedented health community, civic, and religious leaders to announce a major entities, according to local media Kumar, Devi Laal, Niranjan, Pappu, and aid campaign to help India. Nassau County Legislator Rose Brajendra. - Photo credit: New York Times crisis on account of the Marie Walker addresses the gathering. Also seen in the reports. third wave of the picture are Bobby Kumar Kalotee, Chair, Friends For Good The New York Times which broke the temple Tuesday, May 11, following the pandemic. Health (front-3rd from left) and Nassau County Legislator story first, said the FBI agents and other lawsuit accusing the temple of CONTD ON PAGE 36 Richard Nicolello (right of the speaker). TIP photo law enforcement officials raided the CONTD ON PAGE 36 Anupam Kher slams Indian government for the COVID crisis in the country Says "There's More to Life than Image Building" MUMBAI (TIP): Actor Anupam Kher has taken on the government of India over the handling of the coronavirus crisis in the country.He mentioned how it is important for the government to understand that there is more to life than image building and added that criticism is valid in a lot of cases. "I Anupam Kher said that think the criticism is valid in lots of cases. Only an inhuman the criticism is valid in a person will not get affected by the bodies floating," he said in lot of cases. reference to floating bodies in Ganga. CONTD ON PAGE 36 THE INDIAN PANORAMA EDITORIAL FRIDAY MAY 14, 2021 YEARS 02 -: GUEST COMMENTS:- PRESIDENT/PUBLISHER: Prof. Indrajit S. Saluja VICE PRESIDENT: Covid corpses on Ganga Chitagam Saluja CHIEF EDITOR: Visuals of Buxar and Ghazipur expose bogey of a new India Prof Indrajit S. Saluja CONSULTING EDITOR : ovid seems to have taken us back to and hoarding of oxygen cylinders. UP Deepak Dwidedi, Chairman, the colonial times of pestilence and Minister and Lucknow MLA Brajesh Bhaskar Group, Delhi Cfamines, when the poor just floated Pathak, Bareilly MLA Kesar Singh (who ASSISTANT EDITOR: their dead down the nearest river. All the later died), Mohanlalganj MP Kaushal Bidisha Roy tall claims of a new India have washed up Kishore, Basti MP Harish Dwivedi, SPL. REPORTER UNO: on the banks of the holy Ganga in Buxar Bhadohi MLA Dinanath Bhaskar, Kanpur H.S. Panaser in Bihar. Some say 48, others claim to have MP Satyadev Pachauri and others have GRAPHICS DIRECTOR: counted 150 bodies of suspected Covid written similar letters expressing their Om Parkash Malik victims on the Ganga at Chausa block in inability to help their constituents. DIRECTOR Buxar bordering Uttar Pradesh. The Jasrana MLA Pappu Lodhi released a gruesome visuals leave us in no doubt, video on social media of his wife lying on ADMINISTRATION: Covid seems to have taken us back to the Gauri Beri unless UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath colonial times of pestilence and famines, the floor of a Covid ward. disputes it to lock up those who have There are BJP MLAs who have no CONTRIBUTING when the poor just floated their dead down PHOTOGRAPHERS: caught the corpses on camera. The the nearest river. File photo qualms about blaming UP's aggravated officials on either side of the river are second surge on the state's panchayat polls Baldev Singh / BJ Videos Gunjesh Desai / Masala Junction only trying to disown the corpses. Bihar's last rites. and the Kumbh Mela. While they claim Jay Mandal, officials believe that these bodies must This is the story of Covid hitting the that things are getting better, there is no Mohammad Jaffer, have drifted downstream from Hindi heartland, particularly UP, which denying that the situation is dismal in UP. SnapsIndia neighboringGhazipur or further up, has lost four ruling party MLAs to the This is the real India of mindless politico- Mohammad Shahzad, Varanasi. Tuesday's sighting of bodies at pandemic. Union Minister Santosh religious priorities with no health Zia Khan, Ghazipur in UP leaves no doubt that Gangwar had last week written an angry infrastructure, no advance planning for a Nisha Rani villagers upstream are throwing their letter to Adityanath pointing out the known disease, no treatment and finally, Vaaho Photographers, dead in the river, unable to afford their glaring lapses, apathy of medical officers no dignity for its dead. (Tribune, India) Vijay Shah - Photo Journalist. CORRESPONDENTS : SACRAMENTO: Parminder S. Aujla NEW YORK : Dig out Covid truth Chitagam FRESNO: Tarlochan Singh The world must question China on bio-warfare documents DALLAS: ver 34 lakh (3.4 million) people published in the Australian and British amid allegations that the Chinese Harjit Dhesi, Amarjit Dhillon have succumbed to the media, the People's Liberation Army authorities did not offer 'full cooperation' OVERSEAS CORRESPONDENTS Ocoronavirus pandemic in the past documents seem to fantasize that a to the visiting contingent. LONDON year and a half, but the world is still bioweapon attack could cause the China, which again finds itself under Nirpal Singh Shergill awaiting conclusive answers to the all- 'enemy's medical system to collapse'. intense international scrutiny, needs to SPL CORRESPONDENT important questions: Is Covid-19 a man- do a lot of explaining for the whys and DELHI BUREAU CHIEF: made bioweapon? Did the virus leak These 'revelations', predictably wherefores of the 2015 documents. The Chandan Singh accidentally from a lab in Wuhan? Or dismissed by China's state-run Global WHO, on its part, has to ensure that a CHANDIGARH: was there no human lapse at all? Was it Times newspaper as an attempt to thorough investigation is conducted, Manjit Sidhu just a case of transmission from animals tarnish the country's image, have making it incumbent on the Chinese LUDHIANA: to humans? Media reports referring to reignited the global clamor for getting to government to keep the proceedings A.S. Arora, Chinese documents allegedly obtained the bottom of the matter. It's a pity that transparent. Reeling under the second R.P.Sharma by the US State Department have turned the World Health Organisation (WHO), wave of the pandemic, India should push JAIPUR : the spotlight on sinister possibilities. the UN nodal agency spearheading the harder for ascertaining the truth and The papers written by Chinese military fight against Covid-19, has not been able fixing responsibility. With the Union Dr. Yashpaul Goyal scientists and public health officers in to bring us closer to the truth.