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Coast Guard expects information soon on missing aircraft
Chennai: The Indian Coast Guard is expecting some concrete information on its missing Dornier aircraft with a submarine joining the search operations, an officer said on Sunday.
The Coast Guard also refuted television reports of the aircraft being located under water.
“The submarine (INS Sindhudhavaj) has started its search in the area where the aircraft is suspected to have fallen,” a Coast Guard officer told.
“Today, b late evening we should get some information on the missing aircraft. The television reports of locating the aircraft underwater are totally wrong,” he added.
According to him, the aircraft manufacturer is also being requested to assist in the deciphering the reason for the its disappearance.
This is the second Dornier aircraft that went down with three crew in the recent times.
The latest incident comes within months of a Dornier-228 of the Indian Navy with three crew going down in the Arabian Sea off the Goa coast, killing two. The March crash was the first involving a Dornier, inducted by the navy in the mid-90s.
According to the Coast Guard official, there is no similarity of pattern between the two aircrafts -the one that went down last December and the missing aircraft.
“We are doing various studies on the probable cause of aircraft missing,” the official said.
He said the Dornier aircraft has an emergency exit.
“Unless we get the flight data recorder or see the missing aircraft we cannot tell anything,” he said. He also said the tests of multi-coloured oil sheen found on the sea turned negative.
On Saturday survey ship INS Sandhayak, undertaking a sub-surface search, detected intermittent transmission of 37.5 khz, likely to be from the sonar locator beacon of the missing aircraft, the Coast Guard said in a statement issued here.
“The transmission is from around the position where the air traffic control radar lost contact of the aircraft on Monday night,” the statement added.
Ever since the Coast Guard aircraft with three crew members went off the radar around 9.23 p.m. on Monday, an intensive search is on for the last six days to locate it.
The Coast Guard also requested Reliance India Ltd to extend services of a multi-support vessel with remote-operated underwater vehicle for underwater search.
National Institute of Ocean Technology’s research vessel Sagar Nidhi was likely to arrive in the search area on June 14 to augment the search.
The missing Dornier had on board Deputy Commandant Vidyasagar as pilot, his co-pilot and Deputy Commandant Subash Suresh and navigator/observer M.K. Soni – all in their 30s.
The missing aircraft was deployed for surveillance along the Tamil Nadu coast and over Palk Bay.
It took off from Chennai airport around 6 p.m. on June 8 for a surveillance sortie and on its way back it went missing, said a Coast Guard official.
The last contact with the aircraft was at 9 p.m. on Monday while its last known location, as per Trichy radar, was off Karaikal in Puducherry where it was tracked till 9.23 p.m., 95 nautical miles south of Chennai.
“The aircraft was the latest induction in the Coast Guard inventory in 2014 and was being flown by a highly experienced crew,” an official statement said.
The State Scores Extra High on Gaming-Friendly Industry Index
Meghalaya scored 92.85 out of 100 possible points in a Gaming Industry Index and proved to be India’s most gaming-friendly state following its recent profound legislation changes over the field allowing land-based and online gaming, including games of chance, under a licensing regime.
The index by the UK India Business Council (UKIBC) uses a scale of 0 to 100 to measure the level of legalisation on gambling and betting achieved by a state based on the scores over a set of seven different games – lottery, horse racing, betting on sports, poker, rummy, casino and fantasy sports
Starting from February last year, Meghalaya became the third state in India’s northeast to legalise gambling and betting after Sikkim and Nagaland. After consultations with the UKIBC, the state proceeded with the adoption of the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Act, 2021 and the nullification of the Meghalaya Prevention of Gambling Act, 1970. Subsequently in December, the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021 were notified and came into force.
All for the Tourists
The move to legalise and license various forms of offline and online betting and gambling in Meghalaya is aimed at boosting tourism and creating jobs, and altogether raising taxation revenues for the northeastern state. At the same time, the opportunities to bet and gamble legally will be reserved only for tourists and visitors.
“We came out with a Gaming Act and subsequently framed the Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021. The government will accordingly issue licenses to operate games of skill and chance, both online and offline,” said James P. K. Sangma, Meghalaya State Law and Taxation Minister speaking in the capital city of Shillong. “But the legalized gambling and gaming will only be for tourists and not residents of Meghalaya,” he continued.
To be allowed to play, tourists and people visiting the state for work or business purposes will have to prove their non-resident status by presenting appropriate documents, in a process similar to a bank KYC (Know Your Customer) procedure.
Meghalaya Reaches Out to a Vast Market
With 140 millions of people in India estimated to bet regularly on sports, and a total of 370 million desi bettors around prominent sporting events, as per data from one of the latest reports by Esse N Videri, Meghalaya is set to reach out and take a piece of a vast market.
Estimates on the financial value of India’s sports betting market, combined across all types of offline channels and online sports and cricket predictions and betting platforms, speak about amounts between $130 and $150 billion (roughly between ₹9.7 and ₹11.5 lakh crore).
Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Delhi are shown to deliver the highest number of bettors and Meghalaya can count on substantial tourists flow from their betting circles. The sports betting communities of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana are also not to be underestimated.
Among the sports, cricket is most popular, registering 68 percent of the total bet count analyzed by Esse N Videri. Football takes second position with 11 percent of the bets, followed by betting on FIFA at 7 percent and on eCricket at 5 percent. The last position in the Top 5 of popular sports for betting in India is taken by tennis with 3 percent of the bet count.
Local Citizens will Still have Their Teer Betting
Meghalaya residents will still be permitted to participate in teer betting over arrow-shooting results. Teer is a traditional method of gambling, somewhat similar to a lottery draw, and held under the rules of the Meghalaya Regulation of the Game of Arrow Shooting and the Sale of Teer Tickets Act, 2018.
Teer includes bettors wagering on the number of arrows that reach the target which is placed about 50 meters away from a team of 20 archers positioned in a semicircle.
The archers shoot volleys of arrows at the target for ten minutes, and players place their bets choosing a number between 0 and 99 trying to guess the last two digits of the number of arrows that successfully pierce the target.
If, for example, the number of hits is 256, anyone who has bet on 56 wins an amount eight times bigger than their wager.
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