The ICMR is working on a war footing to develop the testing ecosystem -- especially for the screening blood tests. NIV, Pune, is in the process of validating antibody-based screening kits.
After years of living with his family in a poky 110 sq. ft. 'house', textile worker Sambhaji Surve dreams of moving into a home four times the size once the Maharashtra government starts its ambitious redevelopment of the 39-acre Kamathipura shanty town in south-central Mumbai. Sharing his dream are about 8,000 other families hoping for a better life when the redevelopment project, part of the government's effort to redevelop old settlements and make life more livable for some residents, gets underway. The Shiv Sena-Nationalist Congress Party aims to redevelop BDD Chawl and Dharavi but for Surve all the matters is Kamathipura where he arrived in the 1970s from Nasik to work in a textile mill. Kamathipura was originally built 150 years ago following construction of a causeway to connect the seven islands of Mumbai. From the British Raj to post-independence, it became infamous for slums and brothels.
The Bengaluru skies dazzled with somersaults and stunts by metal birds.
United States President Barack Obama has nominated Nisha Desai Biswal as the new assistant secretary of state for south and central Asian affairs.
Obama seeks reduction of nuclear arsenal in India and Pakistan while Pakistan seeks NSG membership
The raids resulted in recovery of documents of some dummy firms linked to Mallya like Gold Reef Investments Ltd and McDowell Holdings Ltd.
Around 15 years ago, when Reliance Industries (RIL) struck natural gas in the Krishna-Godavari (KG) basin off the east coast, the government made plans to supply that fuel cheaply to scores of generators that sprang up in India triggered by the discovery. Most of the plants, which account for 6 per cent of India's total generation capacity, operate sparsely after the KG-D6 area first failed to meet production targets, and then finally shut shop. Affordable domestic gas was why those thermal plants came up and the rate of the fuel today is why those generators hardly operate. Record liquefied natural gas (LNG) rates may yet again unravel India's ambitions to expand use of gas in industries, households and vehicles. Rates, while volatile, may stay strong this decade as developed nations with higher purchasing power embrace gas as the transition fuel.
To counter the pandemic, air transport was suspended from March 25 till May 24 which rendered zero traffic at AAI airports. Even after resumption of flights, traffic is yet to pick up at airports due to quarantine measures implemented by states and an overall fear of flying.
Up to 95 per cent of units in the Noida-Greater Noida mega industrial zone are currently shut.
Here's a glimpse of all that happened around the world last week, in 13 images.
Banerjee, 58, was educated at the University of Calcutta, Jawaharlal Nehru University and Harvard University, where he received his Ph.D in 1988. He is currently the Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The 36-year-old desi speaks impeccable Arabic and quotes freely from the Quran during his speeches, reports Aziz Haniffa.
China tops the list with 3.5 million, followed by Brazil with 918,000.
The sad truth is that the debt-to-GDP ratio will shoot up close to 90 per cent in the coming year, and the fiscal deficit glide path does not promise to reduce it substantially any time soon, predicts Mihir S Sharma.
The Delhi metropolitan area has one of the highest concentrations of population in the world, and suffocating the people of the area on an annual basis should be treated as a crime against humanity, especially when the cause for such suffocation can be controlled, says Arvind Kumar.
'Whom do I want to marry and what decisions I make for marrying the person I love are totally personal decisions, in which neither the State nor the courts have any right to interfere.'
Zakaria, while talking about the unrest in Kashmir, claimed that 'genocide and crimes against humanity committed by India in Kashmir' were going on unabated.
Negotiating a sustainable compromise with Iran is not getting any easier, and this delay might not yield the desired result of bringing Tehran's nuclear programme under stringent limits, says Claude Smadja
By Thursday, 830 confirmed cases of pneumonia, caused by the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), had been reported in 29 provincial-level regions in the country.
With this, multilateral lenders like the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the European Union may continue downgrading Pakistan, making its financial situation more precarious.
Back-to-back droughts in India, the world's largest importer of edible oils and pulses, has boosted prices and made pulses attractive to Canadian farmers.
India has said the current crisis in Gaza can be resolved through a negotiated political settlement and dialogue remains the "only viable option" to effectively address issues confronting the region and its people.
The DGCA official who wrongly assigned the code of Antonov AN-32 -- an aircraft used by the IAF -- to the SpiceJet aircraft has been suspended, report Arindam Majumder and Aneesh Phadnis.
With the maulana fully committed and PML (N) cadres prepared to court arrest, this would be the first time where both Punjabis and Pakhtuns would be standing up against the Pakistan army, notes Rana Banerji, who headed the Pakistan desk at the Research and Analysis Wing, India's external intelligence agency.
In its morning update, the Union health ministry said the total number of positive cases has reached 2,16,919 with a record spike of 9,304 new cases since Wednesday 8 am across the country, while the death toll has increased to 6,075 with 260 more fatalities in this period. A PTI tally of figures announced by different states and union territories, as of 9.50 pm, showed a higher number of confirmed cases across the country at 2,17,389 and the death toll at 6,233.
Days before Narendra Modi arrives in the US to speak at the UN, meet Barack Obama, gupshup with the likes of Nadella, Pichai, Zuckerberg, and address desis in Silicon Valley, his ministers will help set the commercial and strategic tone for the prime minister's visit.
Two US warships fired at least 50 cruise missiles at the Ash Shai'rat airfield in Homs province in western Syria, from where the US administration believes Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad fired the chemical weapons against his own people, media reports said.
Poland, which currently holds the council's rotating presidency, has listed the matter for discussion at 10 am on Friday, the diplomats were quoted as saying.
Senior journalist Darryl D'Monte reports exclusively for Rediff.com from Paris.
The G20 summit has failed to heal the rift over US plans for military action against the embattled Syrian regime, as American President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin could not reach consensus on Friday during "candid and constructive" talks.
Reaction to the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) council's vote to provisionally suspend Russia from the sport for widespread, state-sponsored doping
The highest cap for the capacity would be 2 GW and can be set up in tranches at whatever location the project developer deems fit.
Here is a detailed timeline of the important developments in the matter of Jadhav so far.
'Through a translator, I was able to speak with several of the detainees from India who are seeking asylum.' 'I was saddened to hear the detainees tell us that they are being confined in their cells for up to 22 to 23 hours a day.' 52 Indian are among the 121 asylum-seekers held in an Oregon prison. Rediff.com Senior Contributor Pottayil Rajendran reports from New York on the case that is making headlines in America, India, indeed around the world.
ISI chief Faiz Hameed coerced the Taliban to announce an interim government guaranteed to preserve Pakistan's control over the levers of power in Kabul, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Friday
The @POTUS account, with its 13.2 million followers, moves from the Obama administration to the Trump administration. And, for now, Donald Trump intends to tweet as usual from both!
A combination of externalities such as global trade wars and slowing growth, continuing glitches in accessing offsets under the GST regime, which has created a liquidity crunch for smaller exporters, and the growing competitiveness of smaller countries are causing the slowdown.
Bankers have decided to fight back against 'arbitrary arrests' and 'harassment' by probe agencies.
Amid tensions over the South China Sea, China on Wednesday warned the United States not to take "dangerous actions" that threatens its sovereignty and security interest, days after an American destroyer patrolled the disputed area.
