Liquidity in the banking system has slipped into a deficit for the first time in three weeks, prompting banks to borrow the largest quantum of funds from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in around a month and a half. The key catalyst for the sudden tightening in liquidity was due to outflows on account of advance tax payments, which occur towards the end of a quarter. Analysts also cited other factors such as a currency leakage and possible interventions by the RBI in the foreign exchange market, which contributed to the tighter liquidity conditions.
'Between its natural immunity with Delta, in so many populations, and then getting on top of the vaccination (situation), I do not think India is going to have another bad wave.'
A whitepaper released by the Chinese government gave a lengthy explanation to refute the allegations of cover up and delay by Beijing on reporting the COVID-19 outbreak last year in Wuhan. United States President Donald Trump and leaders of several countries have accused China of not being transparent in reporting the deadly disease, leading to huge human casualties and economic crisis across the world.
The mask can potentially be worn longer, causing less plastic waste as it does not need to be replaced as frequently, the researchers said.
The Centre on Thursday advised states slated to hold assembly polls in the next few months to ramp up COVID vaccination exponentially to protect the vulnerable population given the steady rise in cases of the Omicron variant of coronavirus in India.
The decision to prohibit people, who were yet to receive both doses of COVID-19 vaccine, from using public transport in the state had been taken to ensure those unvaccinated do not endanger the lives of others, it said.
So far the government has been silent on the charges being levelled, even after the stock price rout. Perhaps it is hoping for the share price to settle so that the matter goes away, predicts Aakar Patel.
'Only if the Budget springs some surprises we may see a halt in the selling.'
The WHOS has long held that the coronavirus is spread primarily by large respiratory droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
Amid mounting concerns over the new 'XE' variant of Covid and a day after the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation reported its first case in Mumbai, Maharashtra Health Minister Rajesh Tope on Thursday said the state health department has not received any confirmation about the variant and thus cannot confirm it.
People in a Beijing district with some 2 million residents were ordered Sunday to undergo mass coronavirus testing following a series of infections as China tightened anti-disease controls ahead of the Winter Olympics.
The failure of SVB was due to idiosyncratic reasons, but shows how higher rates can expose fault lines in unforeseen places, observes Neelkanth Mishra.
All the bodies have been sent to the Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital for post-mortem examinations.
India Inc is gearing up for a slugfest this year and from tech to paints, new battlegrounds are emerging, observes Indrajit Gupta, co-founder, Founding Fuel.
For the first time in Maharashtra, four patients of B.A.4 sub-lineage and three cases of B.A.5 sub-lineage of the Omicron variant of coronavirus have been found, the state health department said on Saturday.
In the wake of Omicron cases being detected in a few places in the country, the Union health ministry on Wednesday wrote to states and union territories, stating that patients of the new coronavirus variant have to be treated in designated COVID facilities with separate isolation area.
The Serum Institute of India is the first Indian company to seek approval for the COVID-19 booster dose.
'Vaccination is the only safe way to get immunity.'
A combination of robust vaccination programmes and strict physical distancing rules may be enough to prevent recurring peaks of COVID-19 without greatly restricting the mobility of people, according to a modelling study.
India's economic growth is now 'extremely fragile' and needs all the support that it can get, as private consumption and capital investment are yet to pick up, RBI Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) member Jayanth R Varma said on Friday. Varma further said out of the four engines of growth for the economy, exports and government spending supported the Indian economy through the pandemic, but other engines need to pick up the baton now. " I like to think in terms of the four engines of growth for the economy: exports, government spending, capital investment and private consumption. "...while exports cannot be the main driver of growth because of the global slowdown, government spending is necessarily limited by fiscal constraints," he told PTI.
A DDMA meeting, chaired by Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal and attended by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, also discussed ways to strictly enforce existing restrictions to check the rising cases of the coronavirus and its Omicron variant.
Days after completing a $6.5 billion acquisition of Ambuja Cements and ACC, billionaire Gautam Adani said his group has planned to double cement manufacturing capacity and become the most profitable manufacturer in the country. He saw a multifold rise in cement demand in India on the back of record-breaking economic growth and the government's infrastructure creation push, which will give significant margin expansion. In a speech made at an event to mark the completion of the acquisition on September 17, the Adani Group founder and chairman said the ports-to-energy conglomerate has in a single stroke become the second largest cement manufacturer in the country.
The prime minister also called for more RT-PCR tests.
The average age of those who died was 80.3, and 90 per cent of the fatalities were aged 65 or over, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported.
The government on Tuesday said it has notified the Green Open Access Rules 2022 to further accelerate India's renewable energy programmes. These rules are notified for promoting generation, purchase and consumption of green energy including through waste-to-energy plants. It enables a simplified procedure for the open access to green power, the power ministry said in a statement.
GAIL (India) Ltd has pre-poned the supply of gas from the US and is looking to contract more LNG next year as it doubles down efforts to secure affordable energy supplies to meet the needs of Asia's third-largest economy, chairman Manoj Jain said. India's No.1 gas transporting and marketing firm has long-term liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply contracts from the US to Australia and with Russia, supplementing domestic gas supplies. "In 3Q (October-December 2021) we preponed a couple of cargoes (LNG shiploads) from supplies that we were to receive next year and we did it again in the current quarter," Jain told PTI. This is because US LNG costs one-third of the price of gas available in the spot or current market.
Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said upcoming festivals and mass congregations in different parts of the country may potentially facilitate transmission of infectious diseases, including COVID-19.
That means a manufacturer looking at a market like India needs to decide whether small, cheap cars or small, expensive cars or both will work better for them, says Pavan Lall.
Experts in Singapore, which is seeing a surge in Omicron cases, have warned that the new and supposedly more contagious variant is likely to replace Delta over the coming weeks as the dominant global variant, with the virus being fitter and having a reproductive advantage.
Maharashtra is in the beginning of a second COVID-19 wave, a central team report has said, highlighting that there is very limited active effort to track, test, isolate cases and quarantine contacts, and there is no adherence to COVID appropriate behaviour among people in rural and urban areas in the state.
Shares of Adani group companies witnessed a massive drubbing in morning trade on Monday, tumbling up to 25 per cent, amid reports that the National Securities Depository Ltd (NSDL) has frozen certain FPIs accounts that have holding in some of these firms.
Under the Pradhan Mantri TB Mukt Bharat Abhiyan, an initiative of the government, more than 40,000 Nikshay Mitra are supporting over 10.45 lakh TB patients all over the country presently, the Union health ministry said.
'In the likelihood that Omicron is circulating, you have a much greater chance of getting infected now, than you did during the Age of Delta.'
'If we are to be a contributor to the economy, we have to reduce carbon and imports.' 'We will achieve both -- that's our target.'
New York City mayor Eric Adams and New York City department of health and mental hygiene commissioner Ashwin Vasan on Saturday declared a public health emergency due to the monkeypox outbreak.
Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have pulled out Rs 17,696 crore from the Indian markets in December so far amid uncertainty due to a new coronavirus strain, Omicron, and expectations of faster tapering by the US Federal Reserve. According to the depositories data, FPIs took out Rs 13,470 crore from equities, Rs 4,066 crore from the debt segment and Rs 160 crore from hybrid instruments between December 1-17. In November, FPIs were net sellers to the tune of Rs 2,521 crore in Indian markets.
The latest variant is the most heavily mutated version discovered so far.
Union Minister for Youth Affairs and Sports Anurag Thakur said the Board of Control for Cricket in India should consult the government before sending the cricket team to South Africa, where a new COVID-19 variant is causing havoc.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday granted protection from arrest to businessman Raj Kundra in connection with an FIR registered against him for allegedly distributing pornographic videos.
Supreme Court judge Justice D Y Chandrachud has termed the delay in communicating bail orders to prison authorities as a "very serious deficiency" and stressed the need to address it on a "war footing" as it touches the "human liberty" of every undertrial prisoner.
