As of July 13, at least 111 countries, territories and areas have reported detection of the Delta variant, and this is expected to continue to increase, becoming the dominant variant globally in the coming months.
'This is happening regardless of the Budget.'
India's near-term growth has improved: IMF
Agri experts are meeting FinMin ministry officials on Monday to give their inputs on the Budget.
Tech giant Google on Thursday said it has reviewed hundreds of personal loan apps in India that were flagged by users and government agencies and those found to be violating its user safety policies were immediately removed from its Play Store.
He rued that people who work hard and honestly are put through enormous difficulties and Indians excel in making an ordinary task into an extraordinary one.
The weekend lockdown will start from 8 pm on Fridays and last till 7 am on Mondays. Besides, prohibitory orders will be in force during daytime on weekdays, the Chief Minister's Office (CMO) said in a statement.
The government will create an EV Venture Capital Fund, for financial support to start-ups in the segment. The overall aim is to make Tamil Nadu the preferred destination for EVs and component makers.
I kept insisting that Rs 100 notes were in short supply and there was an urgent need to augment the supply of 100 rupee notes while also rapidly bringing into circulation the proposed new Rs 500 notes. But this was easier said than done because all the note printing machines of the RBI were programmed for printing Rs 2,000 notes and required at least three weeks before the machines could print the new Rs 500 currency notes. The availability of currency paper posed another major bottleneck, and it had to be imported. It was decided to immediately start printing the Rs 500 notes. It was only when the supply of the new Rs 500 notes started improving and the process of change of cassettes at the ATMs gathered momentum that the situation began limping back to normal. A fascinating excerpt from former SBI chairman Rajnish Kumar's The Custodian of Trust: A Banker's Memoir, five years after demonetisation, November 8.
For the urban population, recalibration of ATMs has already started and they will start dispensing the new Rs 2,000 currency notes from Monday or Tuesday.
The disease could go down several paths. One possibility, the least likely, is that it will just disappear. The most likely is that it will have seasonal impact, says Devangshu Datta.
AAdhar cannot be successful unless there is proper coordination at the helm.
'To re-establish the writ of the State and resume governance, frayed tempers in the streets and in the media need to be calmed.'
Ahead of India's annual budget presentation next week, IMF's chief economist Gita Gopinath has favoured the extension of the pandemic support measures, thrust on investment in infrastructure and expanding health sectors programmes like Ayushman Bharat, and a very credible divestment path for commercially viable companies. The Indian government has provided a lot of schemes for small and medium enterprises, most of which is in the form of liquidity support, Gopinath told PTI on Tuesday. "And you want to revisit it and see how effectively that is working and see whether additional support may need to be provided," she said while responding to a question on her recommendations to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, ahead of her presentation of the annual Union Budget on February 1. It would be a good time for banks and Non-Banking Financial Companies (NBFCs) to raise capital given the attractiveness of financing conditions at this point, she said.
'This prime minister thinks he knows everything.' 'He has to consult, he has to talk and he has to mobilise the best people, but having seen him function, I have no expectations from him.'
Deputy CM Manish Sisodia says it's the 'biggest failure of our system'.
The government was also faced with problems on its balance of payments. It took steps to conserve declining foreign exchange reserves, and began to regulate the production, supply and distribution of gold. It banned forward trading in the yellow metal in November 1962, and introduced gold bonds as well, reveals the RBI's annual report for the year ending June 1963.
'If done well, the containment measures can help minimise the impact of the epidemic.'
'What is bank recapitalisation? When the rich take loans and do not return and the government returns that money to the banks.' 'What is restructuring 5:25 scheme? The government says don't return now, just tell us you will return after five years.' 'Why don't we apply these schemes to farmers?' 'I want to increase the power of farmers to blackmail the government as everyone in the country has the power to blackmail.'
'Tens of millions will be working from home for months at a time, which means the smartest brains in business will be focussed on creating more efficient WFH processes,' predicts Devangshu Datta.
Each 'adarsh village' should have piped drinking water, connectivity to the main road, electricity supply to all households, library, telecom and broadband connectivity including CCTVs in public areas. Emphasis will also be on e-governance, says Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com.
'We are not yet out of the woods.' 'If India sees the South African or Brazilian type of mutations, our numbers will rapidly rise.'
With six airports handed over to the Adani group for 50 years, the government is now all set to hand over another 25 airports to private players in a bid to 'monetise' them. Official figures reveal that since 2017-18, the government has spent and will be spending Rs 14,500 crore on significantly revamping infrastructure at most of these airports before handing them over to private players. The Airports Authority of India (AAI), which operates these airports for the government, has spent billions of rupees in building new terminal buildings, runways, reinforcing taxiways, upgrading aircraft landing systems, radars and a host of other heavy duty and capital intensive infrastructure works.
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.
The designation seek to deny Dakhil the resources to plan and carry out terrorist attacks.
Last week, Premier League players had launched the Players Together Fund, which primarily aims to help the NHS.
Critics said a 10-plus per cent annual increase in incomes is a tall order, given that between 2002-03 and 2012-13, farm incomes grew yearly by 3.6 per cent.
The Pakistani military may shortly give Imran Khan the boot, substituting him with another puppet, predicts Lieutenant General Prakash Katoch (retd).
'For now, the AAP is the conversation,' Lord Meghnad Desai tells Rediff.com's Sanchari Bhattacharya. 'Everyone is talking about the 'Delhi model'. They have made so much difference. They have changed politics.'
Government doctors were visiting severely affected areas to distribute medicine for the residents to safeguard themselves against diarrhoea and other water-borne infections.
Incidents like these are a wake-up call, says School Education Secretary Anil Swarup. 'Today, if a particular problem has been found, technology allows solutions to address it,' he says, suggesting alternatives such as printing and distribution of encrypted question papers on the day of the exam. Swarup wants electronic tracking to keep tab on who has access to and can, therefore, leak papers.
India should take 'measured approach' with stimulus packages to deal with COVID-19 by limiting interventions to the provision of food, shelter and basic necessities of life for all; forbearance on payments of outstanding loans; and extra provision of working capital including what will be necessary to cover outstanding wages from lockdown period to enterprises.
Several private hospitals across the country said they have no clarity on procuring COVID-19 vaccines under the new policy announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and that it has led to the vaccination being put on hold at their centres.
The savings would be better spent and might actually reach the poor, says Rahul Khullar.
SVAMITVA is a new government project that primarily aims to demarcate abadi areas that includes inhabitant land, inhabited areas contiguous to abadi and wadis/basties in rural areas, using drone surveying technology.
'The 10% increase in women voters was a determined bloc of voters.' 'They were willing to try this third party, specially because it seemed it had done something in Delhi.'
'It is sad that Kerala had so many Covid patients which is primarily due to the mismanagement of the Left government.' 'The technical committee was full of CPI-M leaders who happen to have medical degrees with no experience in public health.' 'They were advising the CM and we are paying for those mistakes.'
The implementation of the policy would require public health spending to rise to nearly 2.5 per cent of the gross domestic product, from the present dismal one per cent, with the Centre bearing about 40 per cent of it.
The central bank's tough new rules spell major changes in the competitive landscape for financial services audits.
