The Indian government has announced the replacement of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) with the Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin), or VB-G RAM G Act, 2025, effective July 1. The new scheme aims to expand guaranteed wage employment and link it more closely with infrastructure development and climate resilience, but faces concerns from opposition parties and labour rights activists.
Young buyers often underestimate future health risks.
With duties at 15%, GST at 3%, and making charges running as high as 20% -- the gap between a smart purchase and a careless one can easily be Rs 30,000 to Rs 50,000 on every Rs 1 lakh invested. And most of that gap is entirely avoidable. Ramalingam Kalirajan explains the math.
Officials from both India and the US in the recent past have indicated that a "fair deal" will be concluded soon, with Indian officials holding that more formal rounds of talks are not needed.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has accused opposition parties of obstructing the passage of the women's reservation bill in Parliament, alleging they have crushed the dreams of women and prioritised selfish politics over national progress.
The OnePlus 15T has been officially listed in OnePlus/OPPO's China store and is set to launch on March 24, 2026, marking its entry as a compact flagship focused on performance and battery life.
Dalal Street is buzzing with excitement, as some of the most-awaited IPOs are gearing up to hit the market. While some of these big companies are planning to join the stock exchanges towards the end of 2025, others are likely to be available for trading by the first half of 2026.
The overall number of frauds, including those related to loan accounts and digital payments, jumped by three times in FY25, primarily due to reclassification of 122 cases as per a Supreme Court order, the Reserve Bank said on Thursday. The fraud value jumped to Rs 36,014 crore in FY25, up from Rs 12,230 crore in the previous fiscal year, while the number of fraud cases went down to 23,953 in FY25 from 36,060 in FY24.
Rising automobile exports are reflective of the increasing acceptance of India-manufactured vehicles across global markets, according to Economic Survey 2025-26.
India should resist knee-jerk responses to tariff volatility in the US and instead use the current geopolitical churn to build manufacturing scale at home, former G20 Sherpa and former chief executive officer of NITI Aayog Amitabh Kant said on Wednesday.
If TVK MLAs and ministers are perceived as clean, or demonstrably cleaner than their predecessors, the credibility dividend will be enormous. The voter will feel rewarded, points out Ramesh Menon.
rediffGURU Jinal Mehta answers readers' financial planning and health insurance queries
With a confident new generation of innovators, India now has the scale and self-belief to shape its own digital destiny marked by creation, observes Ajay Kumar chairman, UPSC.
From the financial year 2025-2026, the government has introduced a new column in the tax return form for presumptive taxpayers, requiring them to disclose their year-end investments. This requirement was not present last year.
'We have seen that stablecoins lack the basic attributes of money, their advantages are neither unique nor unambiguous and their risks are all too real.'
WhatsApp on Wednesday announced the expansion of its payments service in India to make it easier for people transacting with businesses to pay for purchases directly in the chat, with a choice of UPI apps, including rival digital payment options, as well as credit and debit cards. Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg asserted that India is leading the world in people and businesses embracing messaging. WhatsApp said it is working with partners Razorpay and PayU "to make paying for something as simple as sending a message", as the Meta-owned platform unveiled a host of new features to woo businesses in India's booming commerce market.
India and Israel have elevated their relationship to a special strategic partnership, focusing on enhanced cooperation in trade, technology, and defense, while also addressing regional peace initiatives.
Reliance Industries' digital arm, Jio Platforms, may see its initial public offering (IPO) delayed to the second half of fiscal 2027, according to CreditSights. The delay is primarily attributed to ongoing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, which could impact market conditions and investor sentiment.
Lacking basic safeguards and regulations, India is fast emerging as a hub for illegal online betting and gambling market, with the top 15 such unauthorised platforms logging an alarming over 5.4 billion visits in FY25, according to a report by public policy think-tank on consumer sovereignty.
Prosus, the Amsterdam-based technology investor with net assets valued at over $200 billion spanning payments to e-commerce, has identified India as one of its most critical growth markets, and is increasing its strategic investments here.
UPI-related frauds have accounted for a cumulative loss of Rs 2,145 crore across 2.7 million reported incidents.
Under the defence partnership, India and the UAE are eyeing defence industrial collaboration and cooperation in advanced technologies, cyberspace training, special operations, interoperability of their militaries and counter terrorism.
A merchant using the bank's merchant App, QR code, PoS or Payment gateways, across all segments, including electronics, apparel, grocery, stand to win assured cashback and prizes on volume build-up, EMI or digital transactions.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday asked fintech firms to focus on risk management at a time when criminals are using AI to mimic voices, clone identities and create lifelike videos to manipulate people.
Targets should avoid panicking and hang up. 'Disconnecting stops the scammers from building psychological pressure.'
Police in Uttar Pradesh have detained another person in connection with a kidney transplant racket, revealing possible international links and involving unqualified practitioners across multiple towns. The investigation has led to several arrests and the shutdown of a hospital.
Nearly 7 out of every 10 P2M UPI transactions take place in high frequency categories like groceries, restaurants, pharmacies, fuel service stations, bakeries and utility services such as electricity, gas, water and sanitation.
Overall economic activity continued to hold up in November with demand conditions remaining robust, thanks to strengthening urban demand, but manufacturing and rural demand showed some signs of deceleration even as services remained strong, according to an article on the State of the Economy written by Reserve Bank of India (RBI) officials in the central bank's December bulletin.
Let's work flat out and create a policy framework that fosters the growth of Indian non-family business VC and private equity firms. This will allow our Indian startups' dreams to flourish, explains Ajit Balakrishnan.
'The Digital Rupee will be equal to the Indian rupee in value and backed by the full faith and credit of the RBI/Indian government.'
Paytm (One 97 Communications Ltd), India's full-stack merchant payments leader serving MSMEs and enterprises, has launched a fully redesigned version of its flagship app, integrating artificial intelligence-driven features to streamline and personalise everyday transactions for its users.
Amid increasing popularity of virtual currencies in various parts of the world, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Monday said it is open to exploring the possibility of a digital version of fiat currency. Host of private digital currencies, virtual currencies and cryptocurrencies have gained popularity in recent years, though Indian authorities continue to remain sceptical about them. "In India, the regulators and governments have been sceptical about these currencies and are apprehensive about the associated risks. "Nevertheless, the RBI is exploring the possibility as to whether there is a need for a digital version of fiat currency and in case there is, then how to operationalise it," the RBI said in its booklet on 'Payment Systems in India -- Journey in the Second Decade of the Millennium'.
Uttar Pradesh Police have detained another person in connection with a kidney transplant racket, revealing a network with possible international connections and involving unqualified practitioners. The investigation spans multiple states and involves foreign nationals.
OMCs' Digital India move is likely to have an impact on more than 80.3 million Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana consumers, majority of whom are not exposed to digital transact.
Digital payment solutions provider Paypal on Friday said it will stop offering domestic payment services within India from April 1.
UPI topped Rs 24 trillion in value of transactions and 19 billion in volume for the first time after becoming operational in April 2016.
India and Russia have agreed to encourage joint manufacturing of military hardware and spare parts in India, aiming to improve maintenance of Russian-origin defence equipment and boost overall bilateral defence cooperation.
'The government will carefully regulate and monitor the Digital Rupee, and because the currency is supposed to be tied to INR or supported by reserves, we should expect little fluctuation in pricing.'
This marks a 67% increase from the Rs 2,537 crore lost in scams in 2022-2023.
Non-banking entities such as fintech firms will have to tap into use cases beyond peer-to-peer (P2P) and peer-to-merchant (P2M) transactions to scale up the presence of the retail version of the central bank digital currency (CBDC), which is also known as the e, said industry players. These use cases will enable programmable transactions across domains, including the government's direct benefit transfer (DBT) schemes, with subsidies restricted to specific purposes such as food coupons, hospital bills, fertilisers, pesticides, and cross-border remittances.
