The dinner Jill Biden and her husband US President Joe Biden hosted for Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, June 22, at the White House brought together, Indians and Americans from so many firmaments.
After the finance minister directed public sector banks to join the account aggregator (AA) ecosystem, 5-6 major ones, including State Bank of India (SBI) and Bank of Baroda are expected to go live by July-end. Sahmati, an industry alliance for the AA ecosystem, has been working with PSU banks to get them onboarded for quite some time now. So far, Union Bank of India and Punjab National Bank (PNB) have gone live on the AA ecosystem. While Union Bank has been live for a while, PNB went live earlier this month.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday assured farmer leaders led by Rakesh Tikait and Yudhvir Singh of support to their agitation against the new agriculture laws.
Addressing a press conference at a protest site on the Singhu border, they said the "super bandh" made the government open its 'eyes and ears'.
Modi seems to have an innate faith in his capabilities to handle the myriad challenges confronting the nation and would rather manage the affairs of the nation as a CEO would of a large industrial-business empire, observes Virendra Kapoor.
Union Ministers Smriti Irani and D V Sadananda Gowda have been dropped from Inter-State Council, official sources said on Wednesday.
The best films are not necessarily the most successful -- that would be another list altogether -- although sometimes quality and commerce do converge.
This is part of the first batch of Supplementary Demands for Grants for 2020-21 moved by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Lok Sabha.
The death of the veteran Bollywood actor Rishi Kapoor a huge loss for the Indian film industry.
Amarinder expressed concern over problems faced by farmers living in border areas and called for an increase in central compensation to them to ensure effective and stronger border management.
According to industry figures, the pre-Covid demand for liquid medical oxygen (LMO) before the pandemic was 700 tonnes per day across the country. Now, with the second wave, the demand has gone up more than seven times, reports Jyoti Mukul.
With the farmers' protest against the three new laws and in support of legalising the minimum support price (MSP) going strong, state governments have announced a slew of measures in their annual Budgets to placate farmers. The Centre kicked things off in the Union Budget by assuring farmers that the MSP would continue and coming out with a report card to demonstrate its commitment. However, these efforts don't seem to have yielded tangible results. In their respective Budgets, states chose to go a step further by announcing a variety of measures.
Sharda said Pakistan was frustrated ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi and home minister Amit Shah took charge and was resorting to all sorts of tactics against India as it could not register a single victory in any battle.
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.
The Indian government has sent Union ministers Harsimrat Kaur Badal and Hardeep Singh Puri to represent India at the event.
'What criteria is GoI (government of India) using to judge how long the lockdown is to continue...'
It is likely the government will divide the country into different zones during the proposed extended period of lockdown and might permit a few services to function in safe zones.
The seventh round of talks between protesting unions and three central ministers ended inconclusively on Monday as the farmer leaders insisted on the repeal of the three contentious farm laws right from the beginning, even as the government listed various benefits from the Acts.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's Rs 30,600 crore government guarantee for the bad bank has changed the body language of bankers for the better, observes Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
'The central government is putting conditions on farmers organisations, that they have to allow passenger trains to ply, only then will they allow goods trains to ply.'
The minister noted that while there is an agitation going on one side, there are also lakhs of farmers coming in support of these laws.
According to sources, the government has worked out possible solutions to the provisions on which farm leaders have raised objections.
No improvement in the air quality in Delhi-NCR is expected for another three days, authorities said on Monday, as the Supreme Court directed the Centre to call an emergency meeting to decide on measures like stopping non-essential constructions, transport and power plants by Tuesday evening.
The veteran leader breathed his last at Indira Gandhi Medical College (IGMC) in Shimla at 3.40 am, senior medical superintendent Indira Gandhi Medical College (IGMC) Dr. Janak Raj said.
'Both of us are not politicians. We were forced to enter politics to counter corruption that is looting the country.'
In her four-page resignation letter addressed to the prime minister, she said, 'In view of the decision of the government of India to go ahead with the Bill on the issue of marketing of agricultural produce without addressing and removing the apprehensions of farmers and decision of my party, Shiromani Akali Dal, not to be a part of anything that goes against the interest of farmers, I find it impossible to continue to perform my duties as a minister in the union council of ministers.'
This is the first full-scale review of VIP protectees by the Union home ministry after the Modi 2.0 government took charge.
'The spirit of cooperation between the Centre and states has been diluted in many ways.' 'The level of consultation which used to be there earlier has reduced significantly.'
Tomar also indicated that the government will not repeal the laws.
Three union ministers -- Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar, Food Minister Piyush Goyal and Minister of State for Commerce and Industries Som Prakash -- will hold discussions again with 40 farmer unions' leaders, including the Bharatiya Kisan Union which is spearheading the protests.
Simpler GST structure will be key poll plank, Congress sources tell Archis Mohan.
'Saving our economy is a priority.' 'We have to save our people and save our country.'
Sidhu asserted that he will continue to appear on The Kapil Sharma Show.
Amarinder would hold the portfolios of General Administration, Personnel, Home Affairs and Justice, Vigilance and other departments not assigned to any other minister.
'If one crore is sanctioned to make a road, they spend only Rs 40 lakhs and the remaining 60 lakhs is looted by the politician, bureaucrats and the contractor.'
Even though he consults chief ministers at regular intervals, the ultimate decision is still his own. He will be blamed, nobody else, if, god forbid, there is a huge spurt in fatalities after the reopening, notes Virendra Kapoor.
Labour law changes for three years may not be enough as it takes a couple of years for factories to build and operations at a proper scale start only in the third or fourth year.
'There was already a cash crunch and this (lockdown) has created more trouble.'
Even as Union ministers allay misgivings over Agnipath, figures show a meagre 2.4 per cent of the ex-servicemen who applied for a government job could get one as the Centre and the states have been unable to recruit against the reserved quotas. Public sector undertakings (PSUs), ministries, and officials of Sainik Boards have blamed it on the lack of skill among ex-servicemen. They say veterans' inability to qualify in selection exams is one of reasons for this. Also, non-recognition of qualifications obtained from the military are reasons why their recruitment has remained significantly low, pushing them towards low-skill jobs.
