This is the front page of The Indian Express published on August 8, 1984, Forty Years Ago.
P T Usha created history for India at the Coliseum Stadium when she became the first Indian woman to qualify for the 400-metres hurdles final of the 23rd Olympics in Los Angeles. She clocked her career best time of 55.54 secs to win the second semi-final heat. This provided some instant healing touch as only 30 minutes before that, India had been knocked out of the hockey event.
Indo-Pak Talks
The Indo-Pakistan dialogue, which was suddenly put off till after September is unlikely to be resumed soon. Neither Islamabad nor New Delhi is making any diplomatic move to reschedule the foreign secretaries’ talks on India’s Treaty of Friendship, Peace and Co-operation and Pakistan’s draft of a Non-Aggression Pact in the near future. The two governments are not going to sit together and talk peace till the Indian elections are over.
Tamils In Jaffna
Almost the entire one-million Tamil population of Sri Lanka’s northern Jaffna peninsula remained indoors as the government ordered a major security crackdown to deal with “increased terrorist activity”. A massive combined army and navy operation against suspected Tamil militants in northern Sri Lanka continued centring on Jaffna. At least 22 Tamil separatist suspects were killed, 11 wounded and more than 300 people arrested.
Posting Bullets
About 200 bullets of .22 calibre were recovered by ballistic experts from an unclaimed packet kept in the Madras General Post Office. According to the police, the packet, which did not have either the name of the sender or receiver, was found in one of the nearby post-boxes. The postal authorities sent it to the unclaimed parcel section.
