| The crime, the Covid, the politics and the potholes: Capital Letters — Keeping track of Delhi's week, one beat at a time, through the eyes and words of HT's My Delhi section, with all the perspective, context and analysis you need. Good morning! A 2021 Delhi government plan to reform the city’s liquor market has collapsed endlessly, with the CBI on Friday searching deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia’s home on Friday to investigate “irregularities” in the excise policy, setting off an absolutely colossal showdown between the Aam Aadmi Party and BJP. The Friday raids came around a month after Delhi’s new LG, Vinai Kumar Saxena, alleged a bunch of irregularities in the state government’s 2021-22 excise policy and recommended that the CBI probe the matter. The AAP lashed out at the Centre, accusing it of trying to harass and unsettle the Arvind Kejriwal-led party and to stop its national ambitions. The BJP, on the other hand, has called the AAP “corrupt”, claiming it tried to extend monetary benefits to Delhi’s “liquor mafia”. This newsletter has wound down the long and complex route of Delhi’s beleaguered liquor policy earlier, and you can read a quick lowdown of it here. But, in short, the policy was introduced with an eye on pushing Delhi’s liquor business out of the dark ages into modernity, with discounts, better stores that would stay open till 3am, a lower drinking age, more brands, and so on and so on. But, que sera sera. Whatever won’t be, won’t be. The policy ran into roadblocks from the first day itself, with the state government’s U-turns not helping matters (for instance, it first allowed discounts on liquor in stores, then disallowed them, then allowed them a month later, but with a 25% limit). Now, an FIR by the CBI in its excise policy probe has named Sisodia (who is Delhi’s excise minister) and 15 others, accusing them of criminal conspiracy, falsification of records and under the Prevention of Corruption Act.  (Click to expand) The CBI, in its FIR, said that at least four people who were not part of the administration were “actively involved in irregularities in framing and implementation” of the excise policy. The FIR, registered at 3.30pm on August 17, or roughly 40 hours before agents descended on Sisodia’s home for searches that went on for over 14 hours, lists the senior AAP leader as accused number 1. Sisodia, for his part, stood firmly behind the policy, and called it the “best excise regime” in India, and alleged that the raids were part of the “script to stop Kejriwal who has emerged as a national alternative”. The biggest losers (as things stand) are likely to be those involved in the liquor business and those who like a drink. Liquor vend owners have shut shop, and most have fled the industry, leaving Delhi with fewer stores all across the city. Even these are clearing out their shelves, just counting the days before they down their shutters for good. Hold your beer. You’ll need to. Stories you may have missed | A row over resettling Rohingya migrants A tweet by Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Wednesday saying that Rohingya refugees in Delhi will be moved from their camps to resettlement flats in a west Delhi colony for poor families set off an immediate political storm, with the AAP alleging an attempt to “illegally settle Rohingyas” in the city. The tweet also found condemnation from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, a Hindu right-wing group, which urged the Centre to send Rohingya refugees “out of India”. But hours after the colossal clash, the Union home ministry contradicted Puri and said it had not issued any such resettlement directions. Instead, it said, it has asked the Delhi government to declare the migrants’ present location as a “detention centre”. “Illegal foreigners are to be kept in the detention centre till their deportation as per law. The Government of Delhi has not declared the present location as a detention centre. They have been directed to do the same immediately,” the ministry statement said.  (Click to expand) The confusion appears to have spread from a July 29 meeting chaired by Delhi chief secretary Naresh Kumar, where it was decided that Rohingya families would be moved to the EWS flats in west Delhi’s Bakkarwala. Puri, in a tweet that evening, clarified that the home ministry’s release gave out “the correct position”. According to an MHA estimate, around 40,000 Rohingya refugees, who are followers of Islam, are living in various parts of India after having fled what has been described as ethnic cleansing in Myanmar. Their refuge has been a hotly debated political topic and, as recently as April this year, became the nucleus of a clash between the BJP and AAP over demolition action in Jahangirpuri, an area that had seen communal clashes break out during a Hanuman Jayanti procession. At that time too, the AAP accused the BJP of “engineering” the clashes, by “illegally settling” Rohingya refugees across India. The saffron party, for its part, responded, with the chief of the Delhi BJP urging the municipal corporations to use bulldozers on homes of Rohingya and Bangladeshis. But, caught in this tug-of-war are the Rohingya families, who reside in barely liveable conditions in south-east Delhi’s Madanpur Khadar, desperately hoping for a home. Their hopes have, once again, been dashed. “Living in exile as refugees in Delhi since 2012, around 350 Rohingya live in 53 “enclosures” -- each one with four makeshift walls covered with bed sheets or tarpaulin,” HT’s Prawesh Lama wrote. Most who read the news about Puri’s initial tweet said “it was too good to be true”. “We are not beggars but desperate people who were forced to flee our country. We are helpless here. We were driven out of our homes. My mother died some years ago but I couldn’t meet her. She had escaped to Bangladesh but got stuck there. We do not want flats. We want to return to Myanmar when the time is right, and live peacefully here until then,” said Kabir Ahmed, 40, who lives in the camp with his wife and five children. One more illness to worry about? In the beginning, there was Covid-19. Then, there was dengue. Then monkeypox (which has had a limited spread so far). Now, there are concerns that swine flu infections may be on the rise as well (insert any exasperated face emoji you’d like). Data from the health department shows that Delhi over the past fortnight has reported 15 cases of H1N1, a human respiratory infection caused by an influenza strain that started in pigs (hence the name swine flu). But it doesn’t stop there. Experts and officials in Delhi said that since Covid-19 and swine flu share symptoms, a bunch of people may not be getting tested for the latter, leading to a major undercount in the city.  (Click to expand) Experts said H1N1 is characterised by symptoms such as fever (high grade in some cases), sore throat, nasal congestion, headache, and muscular aches. In some cases, patients can also experience diarrhoea and difficulty in breathing, and when they do, immediate medical help must be sought. Doctors said symptoms typically last for five to seven days and in the case of severe patients, a dose of oseltamivir drug, which is usually advised twice a day for five days, can help control symptoms. But this medication can be taken only on a doctor’s advice, they said. Dr Rajesh Chawla, senior consultant (pulmonology and critical care) at Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, told HT’s Soumya Pillai: “If you test negative for Covid-19, then you must test for H1N1 because there is a great possibility that you might have that. Since the symptoms are essentially the same and there aren’t many distinguishing factors, H1N1 can be easily confused with Covid or the seasonal flu. Since people are not getting tested, we are not getting the true numbers. While H1N1 is not as infectious as Covid, it can manifest into severe symptoms among the elderly and people with low immunity and comorbidities,” Chawla said. | 
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