Addressing a joint session of Parliament on Monday, President Pranab Mukhejee spelled out the Narendra Modi's government's agenda. Here are the highlights of his speech,
'Helicopter drop' was first proposed as an alternative to quantitative easing.
Observing that the economic recovery was not yet fully entrenched, the RBI Governor said recovery is likely to be gradual.
Businessman P C Mustafa wants Indian Americans to return home, Cognizant CEO Francisco D'Souza outlines how Indian tech companies could grow, Gaurav Dalmia has some investment recommendations while Subramanian Swamy warns that India is flirting with a debt trap.
'Most of those involved in these honour killings are the people who belong to the class that feels left out.' 'The high development index in a way is perpetuating conditions that result in social tension.' 'The only solution to the problem is politicise inter-caste marriages.'
Patients from any part of the country will soon need to travel no more than three hours for treatment of the kind available in large metros.
LeT commander Abdul Rehman al-Dakhil was named as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) by the Department of State.
There had been few signs of social distancing as thousands of farmers from Punjab and Haryana began their protest last week against the three new agro-marketing laws, setting off on a march to the national capital.
Regulator's to-do list includes guidelines on traceability mechanism, food recall portal.
The pacts signed after Modi-Hasina talks provided for deeper cooperation between the two countries in areas of water resources, youth affairs, culture, education and coastal surveillance.
'The 24x7 power for all vision is inspiring, because as we've so often seen, where India leads, the world follows,' says Rajiv J Shah, President, The Rockefeller Foundation.
The new economic affairs secretary believes that doing more of the same cannot help; you must do things differently.
Legislators, bureaucrats feel an impact, with works relating to their constituencies stuck at various levels.
The results, while bringing the Congress back to power in this state, also end the rule of the 66-year-old BJP stalwart, who has earned several monikers during his 15-year-long tenure -- Doctor saheb being a trained Ayurvedic medical practitioner, chaur wale baba for his popular rice scheme and the 'Mobile Wale Baba' for giving free smartphones to 50 lakh women and students.
To ensure equal access to health care, the government must consider it in a holistic manner and improve all parameters.
Only three percent of Indians pay income tax; our tax-GDP ratio is among the lowest in the world. This must change. Our elites must realise that India's poverty has damaging consequences for them, and that they can help decrease it. The food security bill, with all its limitations, will hopefully contribute to generating such awareness, says Praful Bidwai.
'Imagine taking care of a patient who is infected with Covid. A human nurse is unable to do that due to fear of infection. The robot can do that task, while it is controlled or supervised by the human nurse. So the robot becomes an extension of the nurse.'
'... the government provides adequate cash and kind support for the poorest of the poor for survival... ...conditional cash and skilling support for the economically poor to raise their incomes to adequate levels... ...and make functional arrangements for providing unemployment allowance to the vulnerable poor during disasters like the present one.'
Frontline healthcare staff, people over the age of 80 and care home workers will be among the first to get the vaccine as part of Phase 1 of the programme from Tuesday, which was approved for rollout by the UK's independent regulator earlier this week.
'The government has said it has kept its powder dry to fight the true battle against the debilitating influence of the pandemic.' 'The release of the shocking economic data this week should act as the fuse for using that powder now.' 'Further delays will make the battle that much harder,' notes Shreekant Sambrani.
'India does not have the wherewithal to successfully manage a full blown covid-19 crisis,' warns Vivek Gumaste.
Moody's said the government will face challenges in achieving its deficit target for the fiscal year ending March 2021, amid persistent structural and cyclical headwinds to growth.
For existing technologies, unless appropriate financing is available, deployment at scale is difficult.
The Bills are primarily aimed at helping the MSME sector and small traders, Finance Minister Piyush Goyal said while introducing these in the Lok Sabha
'We are in the middle of the biggest self created crisis of this government.' 'A crisis which involves and includes citizens and affects the way we go about our lives.' 'It is a crisis that is being managed poorly by the government and, it is absolutely clear, even more shoddily by the Opposition,' says Aakar Patel.
According to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Centre, more than 4,000 people in the US have died due to COVID-19 and nearly 190,000 have been infected by it.
'Given the nature of our jobs, getting infected is a constant fear we all face.' 'The most we do is follow all the rules strictly and pray that we don't get infected.'
In the 2020-21 Budget, the prime minister and the finance minister are keen to stamp their narrative, after various rollbacks following the previous Budget, said top government sources. Besides the scheduled meetings, the sources said, the Prime Minister's Office is expected to hold several meetings with top secretaries and officials on various ongoing schemes, their performance and also how some of them could be tweaked for better results.
What is the guarantee that another Trump will not arise and reach out to the American people directly? The fact of the matter is that Trump's support base remains the envy of any American politician, notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
There will be a huge market for healthcare professionals, data and security experts and digital marketers, says Navneet Singh, founder, Avsar HR Services.
'67 per cent of our transactions happen digitally and about 93 per cent of transactions happen outside the branch.' 'Despite that, there is ample scope for promoting banking-related activities in branches.' 'So, for some time, we will have to, probably, live with the same structure.'
Both protesters and the authorities in Hong Kong are using complex combinations of technology, reports Devangshu Datta.
Stepped up public expenditure must be accompanied by focused policies, advises Vinayak Chatterjee.
'Google and Facebook need to be tamed, their garb of 'Investing in India's future' need to be pulled off,' observes Vibhu Arya.
The first nationwide mock drill was held on January 2 which, the health ministry said, helped to iron out any glitches in the final execution and further refinement of the operational procedures.
India will also play an increasingly important role as one of the Asia-Pacific region's major economic growth engines, helping to drive Asian regional trade and investment flows.
'I am almost tempted to say there is some kind of a vested interest operating to play down the achievements of Modi.' 'I think the focus should be on what has been achieved in 70 days and not on how this government functions.' Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's exclusive interview with Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com on how the Modi sarkar is changing India.
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The power of a nation is directly related to the revenues it realises from its citizens. But India loses a gargantuan Rs 5.8 lakh crore, as the IT department drags its feet over recovering uncollected taxes in time or holding up files in appeal cases, says Mohan Guruswamy.
In a country where 35 to 40 per cent of food is not consumed, the government urgently needs to reduce wastage to an acceptable level.
There are many firsts in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Lok Sabha speech which constitute the cardinal elements of a strategy which has all the potential to serve as the mainspring of the polity for the rest of the century, says B S Raghavan.
