American retail giant Walmart is not keen on opening direct-to-consumer physical stores in India, but will focus on growing its acquisitions - online marketplace Flipkart and payments major PhonePe, a top official said on Friday. It can be noted that the company acquired Flipkart and PhonePe in a $16 billion deal a few years back. "We've got an omnichannel strategy that includes both of those components.
India and the US on Friday said they have started talks to put in place a strategic framework for human space flight by year-end as they plan to send an Indian astronaut to the International Space Station in 2024.
At this year's TIME ball in New York City on Thursday, April 25, you would have run into a Coimbatore-born American scientist, looking lovely in Sabyasachi Mukherjee designer finery, who would most likely have been hanging out with Dua Lipa.
'Keeping Kashmir out of the informal summit does not mean that they have given up their strategic interest.'
Xi will attend the second informal meeting with Modi at Mahabalipuram near Chennai from October 11 to 12 and pay a state visit to Nepal on October 13, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying announced on Wednesday.
Had India agreed to join the trade pact, Indian markets would have been flooded with cheap Chinese products.
Johnson's first visit to India as United Kingdom prime minister will begin on April 21 with a trip to Ahmedabad in Gujarat, which is Prime Minister Modi's home state.
'Instead of writing NAM's obituary, India should reinvent it,' suggests Dr Rup Narayan Das.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi arrived in India Thursday evening in the highest-level visit between the two countries after the ties came under severe strain following the eastern Ladakh standoff nearly two years ago.
"This trip will advance the Biden-Harris administration's rock-solid commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific," White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in Washington, DC on Wednesday.
In an address at the Council of Heads of Government meeting of the eight-member SCO, Vice President Venkaiah Naidu said the most important challenge faced by the region is terrorism, particularly cross-border terrorism, and that India remained concerned about threats emerging from ungoverned spaces as well.
'India's relationship with China has been and will continue to be complex, delicate and sensitive,' says Rup Narayan Das.
The prime minister was speaking at an event to mark golden jubilee of the Aditya Birla Group's presence in Thailand.
Prime Minister Modi's plane Boeing 777, 300ER, K7066 entered the Pakistani airspace from Bahawalpur, passed through Turbat and Panjgur and via Iran and Turkey reached Italy, The Express Tribune reported.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharman on Friday met her counterparts in Singapore and Canada and discussed various issues, including economy, health and opportunities for collaboration. Sitharaman met UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak, Singapore Finance Minister Lawrence Wong and Canada's Deputy Prime Minister & Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland on the sidelines of the G-20 Joint Finance and Health Ministers' meeting. "Finance Minister Smt. @nsitharaman had an engaging discussion with @cafreeland Dy. Prime Minister & Finance Minister of Canada on the sidelines of #G20 Finance & Health Ministers Meeting in #Rome. The Ministers discussed various issues, including economic and health cooperation," a Finance Ministry tweet said.
'Now they're talking about changing the Constitution; they feel they have no reason now to hide their intentions.'
Annual event being organised by FICCI focuses on the investment potential offered by India's infrastructure sector.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday interacted with world leaders, including US President Joe Biden, on the sidelines of the G20 Summit, exchanging pleasantries and showcasing a spirit of camaraderie.
It is important the SCO focus strongly on economic development and regional integration that leads to greater benefits for the least developed regions of member-countries, writes Sana Hashmi.
In a virtual address at the G20 Extraordinary Summit on Afghanistan, Modi also pressed for 'urgent and unhindered' humanitarian assistance to Afghan citizens and underlined the need for having an inclusive administration that includes women and minorities, according to the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
'India will keep trying to avoid conflict.' 'This is the moment when we draw a line in the sand.'
While the economy seems to be on a firm growth path, the fight against inflation is not over yet. Shaktikanta Das seems to be in no hurry. After playing well through a five-year Test match, he doesn't want to get out hit wicket, observes Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
'Are we supposed to look the other way as Islamists go on a rampage against Hindus and the Hasina government pay lip service to secularism?' A revealing excerpt from Avishek Biswas and Deep Halder's book, Being Hindu In Bangladesh: The Untold Story.
Gokhale's visit for bilateral consultations is taking place amid renewed optimism that the vexed issue of listing of Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Muhammed chief Masood Azhar as a global terrorist by the United Nations, which has been stalled by China, is headed for a resolution in the coming weeks
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said the country's economic growth remains a priority for the government, as inflation has come down to a manageable level. Job creation and equitable distribution of wealth remain the other focus areas, she said at India Ideas Summit. "Some of course are red-lettered (priorities), some may not be. Red-lettered ones would of course be jobs, equitable wealth distribution and making sure India is moving on the path of growth.
During the meeting on the sidelines of the 11th BRICS Summit on Wednesday, prime minister Modi said there was a "new direction and new energy" in bilateral ties after the two leaders' second informal summit in Chennai.
A day after the RBI raised the benchmark lending rate by 35 basis points, Kotak Mahindra Bank Managing Director Uday Kotak on Thursday said the central bank may go for one more rate hike to bring inflation below its upper tolerance level of 6 per cent. Yesterday, the RBI indicated that it wants inflation to be within the band first and then move towards the target of 4 per cent, Kotak said at the CII Global Economic Policy Summit 2022. "My sense is that there could be one more rate hike and that may be the time for thinking about a pivot, but we got to watch very closely the data, and maybe around 6.5 per cent as it looks today, subject to what happens to the world, subject to what happens to oil, subject to what happens to many other things," he said.
'I think my first obsessive, possessive and only half-requited -- as we would joke -- 'love' was Ivan. I saw him first slouching down the corridor of St Stephen's College nearly 50 years ago and was instantly smitten (as was everyone else around him).'
Expressing concern over the Russia-Ukraine conflict, India and Australia have underlined the need for an immediate cessation of hostilities and stressed that the contemporary global order has been built on UN Charter, international law and respect for States' sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Ahead of a meeting of oil producers' cartel OPEC, India on Tuesday said the current oil prices are "very challenging" and rates need to be a "little bit sober" lest they impact a consumption-led recovery of the global economy. Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who last week again urged OPEC to phase out its production cuts, said India is a price-sensitive market and it will buy oil wherever it gets competitive rates. The rebound in international oil prices from lows hit last month on the back of demand recovery has led to a spike in petrol and diesel retail prices in India.
Now that the vaccination drive is in full force and Covid-19 restrictions are easing up, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to follow a busy diplomatic calendar in the coming days.
Indian billionaires saw their combined fortunes more than double during the COVID-19 pandemic, and their count shot up by 39 per cent to 142, while the wealth of the ten richest is enough to fund school and higher education of children in the country for 25 years, a new study showed on Monday. In its annual inequality survey released on the first day of the World Economic Forum's online Davos Agenda summit, Oxfam India further said that an additional one per cent tax on the richest 10 per cent can provide the country with nearly 17.7 lakh extra oxygen cylinders, while a similar wealth tax on the 98 richest billionaire families would finance Ayushman Bharat, the world's largest health insurance scheme, for more than seven years. The COVID-19 pandemic saw a huge rush for oxygen cylinders and insurance claims during the second wave last year.
'To the believers of crypto regulations, I have only one question to ask, how will you regulate it?'
For India to reach its bold target of having net-zero emissions by 2070, the country's solar power capacity would have to rise to over 5,600 GW, coal use particularly in the power sector will have to drop by 99 per cent by 2060 and crude oil would need to peak by 2050 and fall substantially by 90 per cent in the two decades thereafter, CEEW India has said. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday surprised delegates at the COP26 climate summit with a bold pledge to cutting emissions at the world's third-biggest emitter to net-zero by 2070. Council on Energy, Environment and Water, a Delhi-based not-for-profit policy research institution, said, "The economic cost of India's net-zero 2070 transition (would be) over USD 13,000 billion between 2030 and 2100."
In the two-day summit, the SCO will kick off the process of India's accession to the grouping as a full-fledged member along with Pakistan.
'In a special gesture, UAE President and Ruler of Abu Dhabi Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, accompanied by senior members of the Royal Family, was at Abu Dhabi airport for the interaction with PM'
Prime Ministers Modi and Abe enjoyed a close and empathetic relationship and this certainly gave a sustained momentum to the India-Japan strategic partnership. It is necessary for India to reach out and engage with his successor as early as possible, advises former foreign secretary Shyam Saran.
Borrowing from BRICS bank will help India avoid other kinds of politics emanating from the West. Overall, the BRICS institutions will necessarily adopt alternative ways of doing things based on their own cultural and socio economic needs, says M K Venu.
'Political meetings will be a mere side show; the main show is economic investment and the business partnership. The success of Modi's US visit will be judged on the basis of India's ability to attract American investment and setting up of manufacturing in India to give jobs to millions,' says Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das on Wednesday replied to the 'history major central bank governor' taunt faced by him, questioning if Argentinian football legend Lionel Messi is also a post-graduate in history. An interviewer anchoring a fireside chat at a summit organised by Business Standard compared his position to an opponent facing Messi at a football arena in Qatar, to which Das replied with wit. "Don't mind it, but was Messi also a post-graduate in history? Not often, but I am sometimes reminded by people that I am supposed to have done history," Das said.
