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News18 March 12, 2018 The NIA on Monday raided the central jail in Srinagar and seized over two dozen mobile phones, jihadi literature and a Pakistani flag apart from data hardware, an official spokesman said. At least 20 teams of the central probe agency, with commandos of the NSG and drones in tow, searched the barracks and open ground of the high-security prison that houses some of the most wanted and dreaded terrorists, including those from Pakistan. The searches, the spokesman said, were carried out in connection with an investigation over the arrest of two youths in Kupwara -- Danish Ghulam Lone and Sohail Ahmed Bhat. The two youths had claimed that the fresh recruits of Al-Badr, a proscribed terrorist organisation, were being sent across for arms training in furtherance of a conspiracy hatched from inside the Central Jail, Srinagar. The searches started early morning and continued till late afternoon during which all the barracks and the open ground wer

The Economic Times March 10, 2018 A leading UK-based think tank has released a research to support its call for a new, more economical visa regime to attract Indian visitors to the country.  The Royal Commonwealth Society (RCS) revealed that the UK was losing out as neighbouring France attracted 185,000 more Indian business visitors and tourists in 2016.  Overall the number of visits to the UK by Indian nationals fell by 1.73 per cent in 2016, while in France it grew by 5.3 per cent.  The UK's market share of Indian outbound tourists has more than halved from 4.4 per cent in 2006 to 1.9 per cent in 2016 600,000 Indians visited France in 2016, 185,000 more than visited the UK, RCS says in its new Britain and India: Building a New Visa Partnership' fact sheet presented to British MPs earlier this week as part of its campaign launched in 2016 for a new UK-India bilateral visa agreement which would considerably reduce the cost of tourist visas.  The new UK-I

The Hindu March 12, 2018 MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar responds positively, highlighting a steady improvement in post-Doklam ties. China on Monday stepped up the on-going messaging between Beijing and New Delhi, highlighting a steady improvement in their post-Doklam ties.In response to a question, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lu Kang, said during his routine briefing that China had noted “positive remarks by the Indian side.” Mr. Lu was apparently referring to observations by Raveesh Kumar, the spokesperson for the Ministry of External Affairs. Positive vibes In response to positive remarks by China’s Foreign Minister regarding the prospects of Beijing-New Delhi ties, Mr. Kumar had said on Friday that India was “willing to work with the Chinese side to develop our relations based on commonalities while dealing with differences on the basis of mutual respect and sensitivity to each other's interests, concerns and aspirations.” He had added that as “two

The Times of India March 14, 2018 A marginal increase in the defence budget + barely accounts for inflation, without helping address the glaring imbalance between cutting-edge weaponry and old equipment in the Indian armed forces, senior military officers have told the parliamentary standing committee on defence. A modern military should typically have 30% of its weaponry and equipment in the state-of-the-art technology category, 40% in current category and 30% in vintage category. But the over 12-lakh strong Indian Army is grappling with an alarming 8% (state-of-the-art), 24% (current) and 68% (vintage) weaponry mix while it’s engaged in daily cross-border firing duels with Pakistan and heightened tensions with China since the Doklam stand-off last year. The Army feels a two-front war scenario is a clear and present danger. “The 2018-2019 budget has dashed our hopes ... The marginal increase barely accounts for inflation and does not even cater for taxes,” Army vice-ch

The Indian Express March 14, 2018 To bring relief to cotton growers hit by pest attacks, the government has cut maximum sale price of genetically modified (GM) Bt cotton seeds to Rs 740 per packet for the second year in a row from Rs 800 earlier. That apart, the royalty fee or trait value payable by domestic seed firms to technology developer Monsanto Mahyco Biotech (India) Ltd (MMBL) has been slashed to Rs 39 per packet from Rs 49. The new prices will come into effect from the 2018 kharif season starting June. A packet of Bt cotton seeds is of 450 gram. The move will benefit 8 million cotton growers, but will reduce the margin of domestic seed companies and also MMBL. According to an agriculture ministry notification, the maximum sale price of a Bt cotton seeds packet has been fixed at Rs 740 for bollgard (BG)-II version, including Rs 39 for the trait value. For the BG-I version, the maximum sale price has been kept unchanged at Rs 635 per packet with no trait

DailyHunt March 11, 2018 Actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan brushed aside allegations that his newly formed party, Makkal Needhi Maiam, was funded by Christian missionaries. "It is ridiculous to say that Christian missionaries are financing me," he said in Erode district, where he is meeting people as part of his tour across Tamil Nadu. Haasan said that he can only laugh at the allegations because they are false. "I did not come to politics as an actor; I have come to politics as a responsible citizen of the country," the 63-year-old chief of Makkal Needhi Maiam said. The actor said that the people were desirous of change and claimed that his party will be able to fulfil the expectations. He also said that the manner in which women are being treated in Tamil Nadu is shameful. Haasan has earlier faced criticism for his alleged "Hindu extremism" remark following which he had, on 1 February, clarified that he was not "an

The Indian Express March 14, 2018 The political crisis in the Maldives, like the “Kashmir issue”, is an “internal” matter and India should trust the local government to solve the problem on its own, a senior minister of the island nation said Tuesday. “Why haven’t we gone into the Kashmir issue… and asked to be an intermediary in the issue? Because they are internal matters,” said Mohamed Shainee, a senior minister and chairman of all-party talks to resolve the impasse. Shainee said that India should trust the Maldives, which “may be a small country”, but is “independent and patriotic”. Asked about the role the Maldives government expected India to play at this juncture, Shainee said that “a third party” has started negotiations to resolve the crisis. He refused to reveal the identity of the third party, but said it was neither India nor China. Shainee was part of a delegation of ministers who addressed reporters from India at the Maldives capital. Dismissin

The Economic Times  March 14, 2018 The government plans to provide benefit of inflation indexation while computing the long-term capital gains tax on shares that were unlisted as on January 31, 2018 in a relief for those holding unlisted shares in startups and other companies.  The indexation benefit would help increase acquisition cost of unlisted shares in line with inflation over the holding period for the purpose of tax calculation, thus reducing the capital gains amount and the tax levied on the gains, officials said. Industry had represented to the government on the issue after long-term capital gains (LTCG) tax was announced in the Union budget. It proposed 10% capital gains tax on shares and equity-oriented mutual funds.  The indexation benefit would be available to those shares that were unlisted as on January 31, 2018 and get listed subsequently, bringing some relief to initial public offer market.  The benefit will also apply to listed shares acquired i

Scroll March 13, 2018 Bedaquiline and delanamid, which are used to treat multi drug-resistant TB, are available to very few Indian patients currently. Sixty international organisations on Monday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, seeking compulsory licences for two medicines used to treat tuberculosis. The organisations requested that the government issue licences for bedaquiline and delanamid – used to treat multi drug-resistant tuberculosis – urgently. The two drugs are advanced medicines on the World Health Organization’s Essential Medicines List for the disease. They are currently available to only very few of India’s 1.3 lakh drug-resistant tuberculosis patients because they are under patent by their manufacturers. The Health Ministry has only 10,000 doses of bedaquiline and 400 doses of delaminid that their manufacturers – Janssen in the United States and Otsuka Pharmaceuticals in Japan – donated. Quoting unidentified officials in the Health Ministry, The

The Wire March 13, 2018  Facing flak over its failure to detect the mega scam in the Punjab National Bank (PNB), the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Tuesday disallowed issuance of Letter of Undertakings (LoUs) and Letters of Comfort (LoCs) for funding imports, in a move that would force importers to use expensive Letters of Credit (LCs) instead, which could increase their transaction costs by 2-5%. LoUs were used by the Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi-promoted companies as a tool to defraud PNB of more than Rs 11,000 crore in a scam that shook the public’s confidence in the country’s public sector banks. PNB officials in a Mumbai corporate branch fraudulently issued LoUs, bypassing the bank’s core banking software. State Bank of India (SBI) and other public sector banks provided financing to these companies against the LoUs issued by PNB. This fraud was going on since 2011. Scamsters Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi and their family members left India before investigative agencies

Rediff March 13, 2018 he Supreme Court on Tuesday extended indefinitely its March 31 deadline for linking bank accounts and mobile phone numbers with Aadhaar. It, however, said the government may continue to seek the 12-digit national biometric identifier number of beneficiaries for transfer of benefits of schemes funded from the consolidated fund of India. “We direct that the interim order passed on December 15, 2017 shall stand extended till the matter is finally heard and the judgment is pronounced,” a five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra said, giving relief to lakhs of people who have not yet linked their bank accounts and mobile phones with Aadhaar. The bench, also comprising Justices A K Sikri, A M Khanwilkar, D Y Chandrachud and Ashok Bhushan, said Aadhaar will not be mandatory for obtaining Tatkal passports too. During the hearing, Attorney General K K Venugopal requested the court that the extension of the deadline should