WhatsApp on Wednesday said it expects to facilitate the purchase of "affordable sachet-sized" health insurance through its platform by the end of the year as part of its efforts to provide users in India with greater access to financial solutions. The Facebook-owned company noted that its 'Payments' feature is now available to users across the country (currently up to 20 million users) with support from banking partners - State Bank of India, HDFC, ICICI and Axis Bank.
According to the Delhi police, Nikita Jacob with arrested accused Disha Ravi, an activist from Bengaluru, were allegedly involved in preparing the document and were in direct touch with "pro-Khalistani elements".
ITC has extensively reset its strategy and will explore opportunities to craft disruptive business models to set up structural drivers helmed by digital and sustainability for its next horizon of growth and make the company future-ready, chairman Sanjiv Puri said on Wednesday. The company is pursuing an accelerated journey to build a dynamic utureTech' enterprise by investing in cutting-edge digital technologies to shape a new paradigm of competitiveness, create innovative business models and tap newer opportunities, he said while addressing shareholders at ITC's virtual annual general meeting. As part of the next horizon vision, the company is "proactively exploring inorganic opportunities" even as it has shrunk "business segments that were incongruent to our growth aspirations, such as the Lifestyle Retailing Business" while the existing growth platforms comprising megabrands will be scaled up and fortified.
The Delhi police had on Saturday increased security arrangements by deploying additional personnel and placing more concrete barriers.
The government on Thursday asked farmer groups to consider its proposals for amending the Acts to address their concerns and said it was open to discussing its offer further whenever the unions want.
He also said the government is sensitive towards farmers and is in discussion with them and their representatives to resolve their concerns.
The application, filed through advocate AP Singh, said, "The Acts were passed hastily without adequate discussion... Inherent weaknesses of the agricultural sector cannot be addressed by way of monetization of farmers."
Chautala said he is 'quite hopeful' that the farmers protesting over the new agri-marketing laws will understand that when the Centre is giving written assurances, it 'a victory for their struggle'.
The Uttar Pradesh government grappled on Monday with the aftermath of violence during a farmers protest in Lakhimpur Kheri, lodging a case against Union minister Ajay Mishra's son, promising a probe by a retired high court judge and stopping opposition leaders from reaching the trouble spot.
Metropolitan Magistrate Prigya Gupta sent Sidhu to the custody after the police alleged he was one of the main instigators of the violent incidents at the Red Fort.
The SKM alleged that increased barricading, including digging trenches, fixing nails on roads, setting up barbed-wire fences, closing internal roads, stopping Internet services and "orchestrating protests through BJP-RSS workers" are part of "attacks" being organised by the government, its police and administration against the farmers.
Mandeep Punia was arrested from the Singhu border on Sunday for allegedly misbehaving with the police personnel on duty at the farmers' protest site there, officials said.
Extended rounds of negotiations having failed, farm leaders now reckon that their best chance to pressure the government lay in defeating the BJP in the coming assembly poll, particularly in UP, observes Virendra Kapoor.
A three-day meet on 'Science-based agricultural transformation towards alleviation of hunger and poverty in the SAARC countries' will discuss the regional agrarian situation, encompassing food insecurity and poverty and suggest necessary policy and programme shifts to meet the Millennium Development Goals.
Ahead of farmers' tractor parade in Delhi on Tuesday, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Monday appealed to farmers to ensure their rally remains peaceful as their stir against agri laws has been so far.
The Congress Working Committee, the highest decision making body of the grand old party, passed a resolution to this effect. The CWC, chaired by Sonia Gandhi earlier discussed the issue along with that of the farmers' agitation and the COVID-19 vaccination drive and passed three resolutions on each of them.
Agri Biotech Foundation, with the mission of promoting Biotechnology, is offering PhD fellowships in agricultural biotechnology and socio-economic aspects of agricultural biotechnology.
It is nearly after 13 years that a foreign brokerage has resumed holistic coverage on stocks of public sector banks (PSBs). To that extent, Morgan Stanley's report dated March 3, where the analysts have listed their order of preference for PSB stocks, is an indication that the state-owned banks may once again be attracting some interest, thanks to three back-to-back quarters of good results in FY21 so far. "State-owned banks' balance sheets have improved, and bad loans formation should moderate going forward," the analysts note and this is the key reason for them to relook at their stance on PSBs. While State Bank of India (SBI) remains their preferred pick, stocks of Bank of Baroda (BOB) and Punjab National Bank (PNB) have been upgraded from 'underweight' to 'equal-weight'. The brokerage maintains its underweight recommendation on Bank of India and Canara Bank.
India, which allowed commercial cultivation of Bt cotton in 2002, has put moratorium on Bt brinjal since February 2010.
Weeks after confusion over three Mauritius-based funds whipsawing shares of Adani group firms, billionaire Gautam Adani on Monday said that "twisted narrative" seems to imply that companies have regulatory powers over their shareholders and can compel disclosures. Shares of port-to-energy group nosedived last month after reports that accounts of three of the six Mauritius-based funds that have invested most of their money in Adani group firms had been frozen by the national share depository. The three funds owned about $6 billion of shares across the conglomerate.
Yogendra Yadav said the decision to defer the march was taken over a forecast of bad weather conditions on Wednesday.
Thousands of farmers, mainly from Punjab and Haryana, are protesting at various borders of the national capital for more than a month against the laws and are demanding that these be repealed.
Asserting that he will not let Punjab plunge into anarchy at any cost and nobody can be allowed to take the law into their hands, the chief minister said he has been forced to toughen his stance as his repeated appeals to perpetrators of such acts had been ignored.
The agriculture ministry also reiterated it is ready to find a "logical solution" to the issues raised by protesting farmer unions.
Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar on Wednesday said the government will continue with reforms in the farm sector as they are still due in many areas, even as he reiterated his hope that protesting farmers will soon come forward to resume their dialogue with the Centre to resolve their concerns over three new laws.
A handwritten note in Punjabi, purportedly left behind by the deceased, says he was unable to bear the "pain of farmers".
Lending his support to the ongoing farmers protests, he said in Lok Sabha that it was not an agitation of the farmers only but a movement of the country and the government will have to repeal the laws.
Farmer leader Rakesh Tikait said business over hunger will not be allowed in the country and once again demanded a law on minimum support price (MSP) for crops along with the repeal of new contentious agri-marketing laws.
Eleven rounds of talks have been held over the contentious farm laws but the impasse continues as the farmer unions remain firm on their demands -- the repeal of the three laws and legal guarantee for Minimum Support Price.
The BJP bagged 1,989 of the 4,371 panchayat samiti seats while the Congress won 1,852 with almost all results of the four-phase local government polls being declared.
British Parliament's Petitions Committee will consider a Westminster Hall debate in the House of Commons complex on the issue of farmers protests and press freedom in India after an online petition attracted over 106,000 signatures.
Director general, Railway Protection Force (RPF), Arun Kumar has asked general managers of zonal railways to keep vigil to contain the impact of the nationwide strike called by farmer groups against the three agri laws.
Modi said his government is carrying out "holistic reforms".
This comes after the government and opposition parties said a consensus has been reached to extend the duration of the allotted time on the discussion on a Motion Thanking the President for his Address to the Joint Sitting of Lok Sabha and Rajaya Sabha at the beginning of the Budget Session, from the currently allocated 10 hours to 15 hours.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday presented the Budget for 2021-22 in the Lok Sabha that is expected to provide relief to the pandemic-hit common man as well as focus more on driving economic recovery through higher spending on healthcare, infrastructure and defence amid rising tensions with neighbours, As India emerges from the COVID-19 crisis, the ninth Budget under the Modi government, including an interim one, is widely expected to focus on boosting spending on job creation and rural development, generous allocations for development schemes, putting more money in the hands of the average taxpayer and easing rules to attract foreign investments.
Sebi will be taking a number of measures to develop a derivatives market of commodities.
As cracks began to appear in their ongoing agitation against the agri laws, farmer unions on Wednesday cancelled their planned march to Parliament on February 1 when the Budget would be presented.
The ten trade unions are National Trades Union Congress, All India Trade Union Congress, Hind Mazdoor Sabha, Centre of Indian Trade Unions, All India United Trade Union Centre, Trade Union Coordination Centre, Self Employed Women's Association, All India Central Council of Trade Unions, Labour Progressive Federation and United Trade Union Congress.
Union leaders, who came out of the meeting venue shouting slogans, said the talks remained deadlocked and some of them threatened to boycott any further meetings if no solution was found at Thursday's meeting.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Monday urged dialogue between the protesting farmers and the Centre while addressing a meeting of Bharatiya Janata Party office-bearers, during which he also invoked the border clashes with China and the construction of the Ram temple.
