Category Archives: Roulette

A public safety alert is being sent out by the DEA warning Americans of an unprecedented surge of fake pills that are being smuggled across the border. These pills, according to DEA PIO Carlos Briano, are being made to look exactly like everyday prescription pills, i.e. Percocet, Adderall and Oxycodone, but are laced with the highly deadly drug, Fentanyl.

There are so many counterfeit pills. The cartels are making them to seem like they are legitimate prescription pills, but theyre not. Instead of an active ingredient they are making it with Fentanyl.

Briano said that Fentanyl is 50 times more potent than Heroin, and two out of every five pills contain a deadly does of the drug, which is a mere 2 milligrams.

So that means that if five people were in this room and we all popped what we though was a Percocet two of us would die?

Are you familiar with the game of Russian Roulette? Briano asked, Thats a one in six. You have better odds of surviving Russian Roulette than popping some of these counterfeit pills because you have a two in five chance of dying. with Russian Roulette you have a one in six chance of dying.

According to the DEA, there has been a 524% increase in the amount of Fentanyl seized at the Southern border over the last few years. In fact, more than 9.5 million pills were seized this year alone. And in the 12 month period ending in January 2021, 279 Kilograms of Fentanyl was seized which is enough, he said, to potentially kill 139 million people.

Briano told KTSM that the reason cartels are making the fake pills and smuggling them across the border in unprecedented amounts, is because the demand in the United States is high, and the cost of making the Fentanyl laced pills is low.

Its profitable for them, with as little as $5,000 they can make up to $1.5 million dollars. With one Kilo of Fentanyl that they can make using precursor chemicals imported from China they can make millions of pills.

But the amount of Fentanyl added to each pill is not consistent because the pills are not being made in legitimate laboratories, instead, they are being manufactured in clandestine labs in Mexico.

The drug trafficking organizations, some of them are international. Once they have the precursor chemicals from China, Briano said The Mexican mega labs which are clandestine labs, make the Fentanyl and start pressing it into pills that are meant to look like Valium. Adderall, Percocet you name it.

Briano said that unsuspecting people here in the United States then go on social media, the dark web or the streets and think they are buying Hydrocodone or another legitimate prescription Opioid pill, but they are actually buying a potentially lethal pill laced with Fentanyl.

They dont even know fentanyl is in the pill, its high school kids who are experimenting, its college kids who are trying to stay up so they take an Adderall, its 30-year-olds, 40-year-olds, housewives, soldiers. Its senior citizens who were impacted by the pandemic and isolated so they turned to drugs.

And those drugs, according to Briano are much more dangerous than they used to be.

In my generation you could experiment with drugs and have a bad day or end up in the hospital.But now in this generation you experiment with drugs and you can get killed.

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DEA: You have better odds of surviving Russian Roulette than popping Fentanyl laced pills - CW33 NewsFix

In 2014, the Chinese multimillionaire Desmond Shum marched in the streets of Hong Kong against the pro-democracy Umbrella Movement, making sure he was seen by representatives from the Hong Kong Liaison Office, the [Peoples Republic of Chinas] main government body in the city. Five years later, Shum was one of the million-plus Hong Kongers who took to the streets against Beijing.

Its common for rich Chinese abroad to discover a sudden passion for democracy and human rights after the Chinese Communist Party has turned against them. But Shums account, which he relates in his new book Red Roulette: An Insiders Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Todays China, is an unusually honestthough not completely frankself-examination. Its also one of the very few insider accounts we have of how things get done at the top in Chinathough it turns out its not that different from how things happen in the middle.

Shum was born into a common strand of the Chinese elite; a once-rich family reduced by Maoism who recovered their wealth through connections, diaspora relatives, and hard graft in the 1990s. He emigrated to Hong Kong with his parents as a child, where they lived in straitened circumstances before becoming rich again through real estate deals.

In 2014, the Chinese multimillionaire Desmond Shum marched in the streets of Hong Kong against the pro-democracy Umbrella Movement, making sure he was seen by representatives from the Hong Kong Liaison Office, the [Peoples Republic of Chinas] main government body in the city. Five years later, Shum was one of the million-plus Hong Kongers who took to the streets against Beijing.

Its common for rich Chinese abroad to discover a sudden passion for democracy and human rights after the Chinese Communist Party has turned against them. But Shums account, which he relates in his new book Red Roulette: An Insiders Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Todays China, is an unusually honestthough not completely frankself-examination. Its also one of the very few insider accounts we have of how things get done at the top in Chinathough it turns out its not that different from how things happen in the middle.

Shum was born into a common strand of the Chinese elite; a once-rich family reduced by Maoism who recovered their wealth through connections, diaspora relatives, and hard graft in the 1990s. He emigrated to Hong Kong with his parents as a child, where they lived in straitened circumstances before becoming rich again through real estate deals.

After studying in the United States, he returned to the mainland in 1994 to work at a private equity firm, ChinaVest, where he rediscovered the stickiness of Chinese relationships. As he notes, every relationship formed among those who work within the Party system in China is saturated by calculations of benefit and loss.

One of the key themes of the book is the tragedy of those ties: that even the most personal of relationships become shaped by mutual backscratching and favor-trading, and that people invest deep emotions in what should be business relationships. As in Mafia movies, the language of the family is everywhereand your family will always betray you.

Shums real introduction into the circles of power came with his marriage to Whitney Duan, an independent-minded female entrepreneur, as he describes her. It was a strategic match: Aligning our goals constituted her idea of romance, he writes. But it was also one that required a deep bond in order to manage that strategy. Navigating human relations in China was such an intricate affair at that level that Whitney needed someone she could trust absolutely with whom she could strategize.

One of those relationships was key to Duans riseand her fall. Before they got married, Duan took Shum to meet the critical authority figure in her life: Zhang Peili, the wife of Chinas then-Premier Wen Jiabao, theoretically the second-most-powerful figure in the party-state. Wen was a moderately popular leader in the 2000s, known for his expressions of concern when visiting disaster victims and occasional calls, never realized, for political reform. His family, meanwhile, was building vast business empiresespecially Zhang.

Shum repeatedly claims that Wen was unaware of the scale of his wifes business. This would be a remarkable feat of innocence, as her empireand her taste for, and dealing in, diamondswas hardly secret. (I heard about it from Chinese friends in 2004, the first year I was in Beijing.)

Indeed, as Richard McGregor noted in his 2010 book The Party, Wen took care to cover up his wifes empire: Under the watchful eye of the propaganda department, however, Ms Zhangs business dealings disappear into a black hole. Wen himself takes care never to appear in public with her and the media in China are not allowed to report on her dealings.

Like many powerful people in China, Zhang had her own court surrounding her. Duan had become a key member of itbecause, in part, she was a rarity: a businesswoman. Powerful women in China often build their own ties to each other, because theyre excluded from the stereotypically masculine activities that make up a lot of business bonding.

For Duan, Shum was a partner who could handle that side while she worked to strengthen her ties to Zhang. With Whitney, [Zhangs] relationship was also hierarchical, but there was more give-and-take, Shum writes. All of Auntie Zhangs ties were seasoned with a healthy dose of coldhearted calculation and manipulation but also genuine emotion. Whitney and I thought we knew how the game was played. We didnt fear her.

Shum had several qualities that made him attractive to Duanand Zhangincluding his connections in Hong Kong and U.S. business circles. But the key factor may have been his looks. Shum is 6-foot-5 (which is remarkably tall in China), handsome, and a former athlete who nearly made the Olympic swim team for Hong Kong. The very wealthy in China have a habit of collecting talent: ping-pong players, calligraphers, fortunetellers, Buddhist masters, top university graduates. Shum slotted right in.

Over the next decade, Duan and Shum became a power couple, rising from the lower echelons of Chinese wealth to the heights of the mega-wealthy thanks to their ability to generate money for their patron, Zhang. We were like the fish that clean the teeth of crocodiles, Shum writes.

At first, they were over-leveraged financiallybut still living extravagantly, as their position demanded, forcing Shum to borrow money repeatedly from his parents, $100,000 here, $200,000 there, just to tide us over. But after they oversaw the expansion of the Beijing airport and got a stake in massive party-backed insurance company Ping An, they reached the stratosphere.

Throughout all this, Shum says, they imagined they were creating a better, more democratic China. They were also, of course, driving Rolls-Royces, buying handcrafted Swiss watches, and living in five-star hotel suites.

But one of the paradoxes of Chinese wealth can be how little you get to enjoy it. As others including the anthropologists John Osburg and Elanah Uretsky have shown, the work of keeping up business and political relationships is exhausting. Shum found himself wooing a constant stream of businesspeople, officials, and gangstersall of whom want power, money, and sex. Whitney and I could provide access to power, so we needed to offer less money and arrange for less sex. (Note that he accurately says less, not none.)

He routinely dropped tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars on gambling, wine, shopping sprees, and restaurant bills for those hes courting. All this is very familiar from the lower echelons of Chinese business; the sums are just larger. Shum also insists that Whitney and I had always been careful in our dealings to stay within the boundaries of the law.

Others were apparently not so careful. Any good Mafia movie has its share of people getting whacked, after all. Shum became friends with airport boss Li Peiying (executed by the government in 2009). Lis fatal mistake, Shum notes, was speaking too much. The Chinese Communist Party has its own code of omert [the Mafias code of silence], Shum added. He got close to Sun Zhengcai (imprisoned for life in 2018), a rising star of the party. He advised Ling Gu (died in suspicious car crash in 2012) and Lings father, then-President Hu Jintaos top aide Ling Jihua (sentenced to life in 2016).

Eventually, it was Duans and Shums turn in the barrel. A New York Times expos in 2012 left Duan dangerously exposedat the same time that their marriage started to fall apart, with Shum resentful at her control of the purse strings (and angry at his discovery that his wife is two years older than him, not three months younger).

Zhang effectively hung them out to dry, despite Duans loyalty to her. The rise of President Xi Jinping, meanwhile, brought the gradual elimination of the party factions they had depended on and the renewed dominance of the red aristocracythose born into the very top levels of party families, not mere gentry like Duan and Shum. But they remained connected even after a bitter divorce in 2015, thanks to a son togetherand Shum was shocked when Duan disappeared in 2017.

With this book, Shum has effectively broken the partys omert himself. (Duan reappeared in a phone call just before the book came out, warning Shum off publishing it.) There are fascinatingbut often second- or thirdhandaccounts of party politics, such as the fall of Bo Xilai, within its pages.

Its also very well written; in the acknowledgments, Shum notes his writing partner John Pomfret, an experienced China journalist and historian. And it would make a tremendous movie about wealth, power, and oppression in China. Its a shame that, thanks to that same power and oppression, no one in Hollywood will ever have the guts to make it.

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Desmond Shum's Insider Look at China's Wealthy Elite in 'Red Roulette' - Foreign Policy

The HSE is playing Russian roulette with the lives of dozens of severely disabled children by running a school with no therapists on-site, the father of one of the children has claimed.

Carmonas Special School in Glenageary, South Dublin, which caters for pupils between the ages of four and 16 with severe intellectual disabilities, welcomed their pupils back in late August.

However, the team of therapists which had always been on site and ready to deal with any life-threatening incidents since 2002 have been moved out of the school, the father claims.

The HSE's decision to move the much-needed clinicians flew in the face of direct promises made to the concerned parents by Minister for Disabilities Anne Rabbitte.

Minister Rabbitte met with parents in person at Carmona school in June and confirmed that the HSE had been instructed not to remove therapists from special schools," said Andrew Murnaghan, the official parents representative at Carmona School.

Yet, the HSE have continued to ignore this direction and took steps to remove these vital supports from the school."

Mr Murnaghan, whose daughter attends the school, said the HSEs actions were disgraceful.

He said: Their indifference to the plight of the children - and these are the most compromised children you will ever meet - is disgraceful. It is reprehensible.

Everyday there isnt a physiotherapist based on-site at the school - the HSE are playing Russian roulette with those children and their lives.

Since 2002, there has been a team of speech and language therapists, occupational therapists and physiotherapists based on site at the school.

Many of the children are wheelchair-bound and are completely unable to speak. The therapists help them to communicate through sign language, advise on modified diets because the children can choke easily, and even drain mucus from their lungs because they are unable to cough.

As a result of the change, Mr Murnaghan said: My daughter has had no speech and language therapy. So that is horrific because they help her to communicate.

That causes extreme frustration for the kids and can cause them to have self-harming behaviours as well because they are not being helped to communicate.

Not only do the therapists do all this, Mr Murnaghan said there have been three incidents where they gave life-saving CPR to a child in the crucial time in between the child falling ill and the ambulance arriving.

The stressed-out parents found out about the decision to move the therapists through a letter sent on the last day of term.

Andrew said: They sent a letter on the last day of the school term to the parents. These are parents who are up the walls having nervous breakdowns looking after their kids.

Despite Andrew receiving confirmation from Minister Rabbitte that the clinicians would not be moved at a meeting in June, they came back to the school and found they had split.

He said: Unbeknownst to us, they were already moving files and following instructions from the HSE to move off site so we came back to school in September and there was nobody there.

Minister Anne Rabbitte said in a statement that the Childrens Disability Network Teams are in attendance on site at Carmona.

She said: I am informed by the HSE that since the reconfiguration into Childrens Disability Network Teams (CDNTs) on the 13th September last, the CDNTs are in attendance on site at Carmona as per the agreed existing allocation as was pre-Covid.

She added: To ensure parents are fully and accurately informed of this plan, I have sought for a meeting locally between the HSE and parents to discuss the issues and to assure parents that services will be provided on site by the Network Team to support their children.

Dublin Live has contacted the HSE for comment.

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HSE accused of 'playing Russian roulette' with severely disabled children in Dublin school - Dublin Live

Today, most people know the term card counting as some sort of casino legend. Most wrongfully assume card counting is illegal, limited to savant geniuses, or that it simply cant happen with modern security. In reality, card counting in blackjack is legalthough most casinos retain the right to remove suspected card counters from their grounds.

Over the years, Hollywood has incorporated card counting into high-stakes dramas, from Rain Man to 21. Only a few have been (loosely) based on the real-life gig, such as Kevin Spaceys demanding leader of an MIT card counting group in 21.

Few projects have been able to accurately depict both the nuance and statistical knowledge needed to pull off card countingespecially now that most casinos use multiple decks (or shoes) to prevent potential counters. In fact, its likely a dying art.

First, casinos are smart to most modern card counting operations. Advances in security measures have made card counters less successful than ever. Second, many gamers have moved to virtual tables for access to online US casino bonuses, the convenience of playing remotely, and less social pressure from other players.

This doesnt mean card counting has disappeared or will anytime soon. Instead, it hints that the existing teams are more invisible than ever, and have likely devised strategies for staying under the radar. As shown by Edward Thorp, the father of card counting, discretion pays.

For the Love of Stats

In reality, MIT was actually involved in blackjack card counting, as shown in the film 21. Back in 1958, a man named Edward Thorp graduated from UCLA with a doctorate in mathematics. He then headed to MIT, where he worked as a professor of mathematics before moving to New Mexico State University in 1961.

During his time at MIT and New Mexico University, Thorp translated his knowledge of probability into a strategy for beating the house at blackjack. He did this by applying probability theories that hed studied in school toward blackjack. Using mathematics and statistics, Thorp proved that it was possible to beat the house.

He published his findings in Beat the Dealer in 1962. The book is hailed as the seminal work that subsequent card counters would rely on. One gamer in the 70s, Al Francesco, used Beat the Dealer strategies to form an elite card-counting team. Soon after, one of his team members, Ken Uston (a graduate of MIT), published a tell-all book about card counting strategy and teams, titled Million Dollar Blackjack in 1982.

Men like Francesco and Uston helped turn card counting into a flashy, Hollywood-worthy topic. However, Thorp never deviated from his emphasis on probability theory. In fact, he translated his findings in blackjack to the stock market with great success.

For gamers, Edward Thorp is the father of card counting. But for economists and financial strategists, Thorp is known as the father of quant investing. Here are three of his greatest contributions beyond the realm of blackjack.

One: The Quant Fund

Half a century before machine learning algorithms started handling data to solve problems, Thorp knew the value of numerical data. He used economic data to create quantitative analysis on investment funds to determine their security and make solid investments.

Today, economists use customized software programs to determine these predictions. Back in the day, Thorp used his knowledge of probability and statistics to make these determinations. This helped him make huge amounts in the securities market, as well as launch the very first quant hedge fund.

His understanding of the market from a statistical perspective helped Thorp reveal Bernie Madoff as a scammer a full decade before others were any the wiser. But his early work has had other, greater effects. It highlighted one of the earliest applications of big data, which are now used by financial professionals to gain perspective on markets.

Two: A Wearable Computer to Tackle Roulette

Though Thorp spent most of his career working in the stock market, he returned to the casino to tackle roulette from a probability standpoint. His desire to create a system for beating the house in roulette led him to create the first wearable computer with fellow mathematician Claude Shannon.

Shortly after publishing Beat the Dealer, Thorp and Shannon created a system to gauge how fast the roulette wheel was spun and, thus, where the ball was likely to land. To do this, two players would be present at the roulette table. One would input the cadence of the spun wheel, while the other would hear this message through an earpiece.

The device was later made illegal, but not before Thorp and Shannon learned how to gain a 44% edge on the house. Their work in roulette wouldnt last quite as long but, similar to quant hedge funds, Thorps early work with wearable technology would prove to be a hit in the decades to come.

Three: Market Neutral Derivatives Hedging

Though quant funds have become a standard part of financial technology in the stock market, Thorp made meaningful contributions to market-neutral funds, too. Market-neutral funds look to create small profits regardless of how the market is moving.

This idea is deceptively complex. In order to maintain year-over-year profit, professionals need to implement strategies that are often highly leveraged, which can generate risk. In other words, its not quite as stable as the standard mutual fund, leading many to regard them as high-risk.

In the coming years, indexes like the S&P 500 would become a benchmark for many in the industry. However, Thorp was able to achieve profitability by creating an options pricing formula long before the S&P 500 model emerged. His first hedge fund, Princeton Newport Partners, compounded at 19.1%, much greater than the prevailing S&P standard.

This also led Thorp to Ken Griffins Citadel, which is one of the most influential and successful hedge funds ever created, where he served as the first limited partner. Thorp inspired other big players in the stock markets, including the manager of one of the worlds largest mutual funds, Bill Gross, who went on to become known as the bond king.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or the management of EconoTimes

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Three Financial & Technological Contributions from the Father of Card Counting - EconoTimes

Wondering what the new FIFA 22 skill moves are? Then you've landed in exactly the right place. There are four fresh ones added to FIFA 22: the Skilled Bridge, Four-Touch Turn, Scoop Turn Fake, and First-Time Spin. You need a player with a four-star skill moves rating to pull off the first three, while that last one can only be nailed by those with five-stars in the skill moves department. But it's not just the new tricks covered by this guide: keep scrolling down the page for the complete FIFA 22 skill moves list.

The FIFA 22 skill moves list below is split into five categories. Every player in the game has an independent 'skill moves' rating, which you can find on their attributes screen, and determines how many tricks he or she can pull off. One-star players can only unleash moves in that category, whereas five-star players can nail every last one. As you'd expect, most defenders have lower ratings, while wingers can often be found with four stars and above.

These are the basic tricks that anyone can pull off even goalkeepers. Even so, you're brave busting any of them out using Aaron Ramsdale.

99% of outfield players have two-star skills so you shouldn't have any trouble doing these nifty tricks.

Most midfielders and forwards have three star skills, enabling them to pull off 'classic' FIFA favourites such as the Roulette and Heel Chop.

Three new moves join the four-star category for FIFA 22: the Four-Touch Turn, the Scoop Turn Fake, and the Skilled Bridge. Just don't go trying them up at Powerleague.

The best of the best and priciest of the priciest, in so far as Ultimate Team is concerned. The First-Time Spin is brand new for FIFA 22.

Those with five-star skill moves also have bespoke juggling moves. Nail these to properly humiliate opponents, if that's your thing.

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FIFA 22 skill moves: All the tricks you can do on the pitch this year - Gamesradar

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Roulette Tips That Will Help You Win - blog.casino.com

Its the second-last day of the NHL prospect tournament in Traverse City and Jim Nill is standing outside the Stars dressing room.

When a reporter asks him what he and his scouting staff saw when they selected Conner Roulette in the fourth round of the 2021 NHL Draft, he tilts his head forward, as if peering over glasses that arent currently on his face, lifting his hand toward his face.

Hes got, Nill says, tapping on his temple, hes got in up here.Hes got great hockey sense and skill. Now, hes like 80 percent of the other kids where now its about what he can do off the ice in the gym to get stronger and quicker. If he can put in the time doing that, hes got a chance because hes got the brain.

That thing, his mind, is hard to identify and evaluate. But everyone who knows Roulette knows that he has it. And like Nill, they say the skys the limit if he can build the rest, specifically the thin frame that is plain to see when he steps out of the dressing room after Nill and his Stars workout shirt drapes over his slight shoulders.

One of the first things todays scouts, development coaches and general managers will tell you about todays players is that not enough of them actually watch hockey.

But if you ask Roulette to describe his game or identify his strengths and weaknesses, hell start by saying that hes a student of the game before he dives into any of the finer details.

Hell talk about his strengths, pointing to his poise with the puck, his ability to slow the game down, his hockey IQ, the way he reads plays and his touch inside the offensive zone.

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Meet Stars prospect Conner Roulette, a student of the game primed for a breakout - The Athletic

Rounding out our big winners is Moss from Kuwait. Playing live roulette and slots, Moss proved themselves a strong player, collecting a series of wins over months. Starting with a balance of $25,000, the last winnings claimed by Moss ended with a session winning $385,600.08.

The month before, Moss brought home $138,608.38. Before this, they claimed $124,215.16. Eventually winning total prizes of just over $4 million, Moss goes down as our biggest winner, at least so far.

So successful was Mosss run, that even they could barely believe their luck, stating: Im fine brother thank you I loved the Play Last night!! Crazy!

And crazy when I won more money, I swear I didnt need, I said is enough!!

As we sent this player some more family-friendly congratulatory gifts of bonuses and candy, they were quite happy to move onto whatever life has for them next.

Though these are the biggest winners weve had on our website yet, they only represent a tiny fraction of our overall winning player-base. As time goes by, we hope and expect to be celebrating many, many more big wins.

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The History and Stories of Roulette's Biggest Ever Winners - blog.casino.com

Navjot Singh Sidhu and Punjab CM Charanjit Singh Channi  |  Photo Credit: BCCL

Congress has made an art of passing the buck. Unfortunately, the buck never stops with Rahul Gandhi. Given the debilitating condition of the party, the now-not-so-young scion along with his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is busy replacing the old guard with new imports in all states that the party is even sparsely relevant. The vitriolic drama to uproot Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh has not been an exception, except that it hogged a larger piece of the limelight. The Captain went out kicking and screaming, and rightly so. The high command should have known that the Maharaja of Patiala would have had more self-respect than would allow him to swallow the disgrace heaped upon him.

A fuming Amarinder Singh said that he has never been so humiliated in his life and though he had treated Rahul and Priyanka as his grandchildren, they were clearly misguided. Even an average bystander of news felt that the Gandhis had gone a little too overboard in their zeal to let Navjot Singh Sidhu have his way. Despite his obvious insolence, Sidhu was allowed, or rather encouraged, to take repeated potshots at Amarinder and punch holes in his governance model.

The allegations hurled at the former CM were several ranging from injustice to those killed while protesting the alleged desecration of Shri Guru Granth Sahib to his indifference to the farmers movement to his hands-off approach to administration to the inability to tackle longstanding problems of drugs and transport mafia, the laundry list is long. Yet, he has not been given a fair chance. Ideally or normally, Sonia Gandhi would have invited Amarinder for a private meeting in New Delhi and sought clarification. But the days of such dignified propriety are over; the CM was summoned to provide clarification to charges levelled against him by a committee and this was turned into a highly publicised affair, while the former cricketer Sidhu was totally spared any reprimand for his impudent behaviour. In earlier days, dissidents were given a hearing through aides but never allowed to embarrass those occupying top seats and representing parties. In fact, despite Sidhus boorishness, he was made the Pradesh Congress chief though the CM had opposed his appointment tooth and nail.

The last straw was when in the wake of a fresh letter by dissidents, a surreptitious meeting was called of the Congress Legislature Party without the information of the CM; it was then that Amarinder decided that he had had enough.

Amarinder Singh addressing the press after submitting resignation | Pic Credit: BCCL

What the Congress is seeking to achieve by handling Punjab like this is anybodys guess. The party under Amarinder had a very strong chance to return to power especially as BJP and Akali Dals stakes are down over the farmer agitation and AAP is no longer as relevant as it was in 2017. Yet, the Congress has chosen to throw away this chance and reinvent the wheel!

Not only has Sidhu been elevated as the party chief, but he also has a chance to be named the CM candidate. The other three Charanjit Singh Channi, Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa and OP Soni, who have been promoted were opposed to the Captain. The party seems to have made a calculated move to consolidate the huge 35% Dalit vote in the state by installing Channi and keeping Jats and Hindus amused by naming Randhawa and Soni as Deputy CMs. Amarinder loyalist Brahma Mohindra has been deliberately kept out as also all Captains loyalists from the new cabinet that was sworn in this Sunday.

Charanjit Singh Channi taking oath | Pic Credit: BCCL

Obviously, Congress has little to do with ideology now, considering the backing Sidhu has got despite him starting his political career with the BJP and rising through its ranks. The Congress by doing the caste maths might have wanted to give at least a cosmetic chance to a Dalit, a first in the state. Jats despite their 20-25% population have given Punjab 13 CMs. Thus a Dalit face might also work as a counter to Akali Dal, which has aligned with the BSP, a party started by Kanshi Ram, a Sikh SC from Punjab who made his mark in UP politics. OBCs and Dalits together comprise 62-63% of Punjabs population of which Ramdasias, the community Channi belongs to, are about 12-14%. Besides, Brahmins and Khatris are about 8% of the population.

In 2017, the Congress won 22 seats out of 34 reserved for Scheduled Castes, the reason Channi might have been given a chance. What the party needs to remember is that now that Channi has been symbolically elevated for about 100 days, how would the community react if Sidhu emerges as the CM face during the upcoming elections. Would not Dalits see through the mere tokenism?

Rahul Gandhi and Charanjit Singh Channi | Pic Credit: BCCL

Charanjit, an astute politician from Kharar, on his part is likely to get the party leaders to rally together and will be careful not to take on Sidhu openly. He has been a grassroots politician and was a student leader for many years before joining state politics. The one lesson Channi would have learnt over the years would be that of not taking anything for granted. Despite a thumping win under the leadership of Amarinder in 2017, the high command made him wait till he was finally announced as the next chief minister. This 3-4 months window is the chance that Channi has got to play his cards well and establish his position. Otherwise, he will be relegated aside as a puppet who was used as an interim tool. Conversely, a spectacular short stint could even put him in a position to put the rising star Navjot Singh Sidhu on the mat.

The Shiromani Akali Dal under Parkash Singh Badal was once considered the centrepiece of Punjab politics but in the 2017 elections, the party along with its ally BJP was decimated grabbing only 15 of the 117 seats. Not only was the party facing anti-incumbency, its vote share dropped by 10 percentage points mainly due to AAPs entry. It remains to be seen whether SADs fresh alliance with Mayawatis Bahujan Samaj Party will yield more positive results considering that it has now dumped the BJP.

Amarinder in turn has openly voiced concerns and Sidhus administrative ability as well as the dangers of him leading a border state given his warm relations with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan and Army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa, who is also a Punjabi Jat. It might be recalled that Sidhu had attended the opening ceremony of the Kartarpur corridor despite the CM calling it a security threat. Amarinder is now indicating new political innings, and BJP could be the next destination. For the BJP too, enrolling Amarinder Singh at the dusk of his career could provide a ray of hope after the severe image drubbing it has got by bringing in the farm laws. Amarinder has struck a buoyant note saying one could be old at 40 and young at 80. But the saffron party may not be the ideal choice given the level of resentment the farmers have against it at this point in time. Nevertheless, if BJP is indeed the Captains next destination, it could well be its only hope of a lotus bloom in the border state.

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Humiliated Captain to 'humble' Channi: Congress plays the roulette in Punjab - Times Now

Roulette is one of the most popular casino games in the world. No matter where you go, just about every Indian casino offers this classic game, as its easy to play and provides loads of fun. The sights and sounds of the Roulette wheel have become synonymous with casino gambling, and the number of betting options makes it extremely popular with all types of players.

You may have played Roulette before, but have you played all the different versions of the game? Below are some of the most common Roulette versions youll find at online and land-based casinos. Whether youre looking to play free online cash winning games in India or want to gamble real money, these games are great fun!

American Roulette is one of the newer variants of the classic game, and its so named because it was invented in the United States, where its also the most common variation youll find. In most land-based casinos, American Roulette is the only version you can play, but online casinos often also offer European and French versions.

What sets American Roulette apart is that it has two green pockets, the 0 and 00. This increases the house edge significantly, as it means that theres a slightly lower chance of a red or black bet. Although it has a lower average payout rate compared to other versions of the game, its still very popular to play in India and other countries thanks to simple rules and big payouts.

European Roulette is the most popular version of the classic game, and it has a lower house edge than the American game. European Roulette only has one green pocket, the 0, and its return to player rate is around 98%. Because of its popularity, this version of Roulette can be found in casinos all over the world and Indian players can also join in the fun of spinning the wheel.

Like the other versions of Roulette, the European version requires players to place their bets on the table and wait to see where the ball lands when the wheel stops spinning. Players have a range of betting options, including high-risk, high-reward options, and low-risk, low-reward but theres always a risk, no matter what you bet on. Thats why you should always be responsible, unlike this man who bet his life savings at the Roulette table.

France is where Roulette was most likely invented. Early versions of the game were played in 18th Century France by nobles, although it was based on a previous game invented in Italy. Still, the French version of Roulette has become particularly well-known in India and around the world thanks to its unique rules and a high return to player rate.

The main reason why French Roulette is so fair to the players is that it has the En Prison rule. In any other version of Roulette, the player loses their bet if the ball lands on green. With En Prison in play, the players stake will instead be placed in prison and used on the next spin of the wheel. If the players bet wins that round, theyll receive their stake back. The La Partage rule is similar, only it gives the player back half of their stake if the ball lands on the green.

While the three above versions of Roulette are the most popular, there are plenty of other rulesets that add new ways to win and new features. These games include:

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Do You Know All Types of Roulette? - IndiaPost.com