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January 31, 2019 The Hindu Sriram Lakshman Last Friday morning as the U.S. federal  government  shutdown entered its 35th day there were reports of mounting flight delays in New York City’s LaGuardia airport, as an unusual number of air traffic controllers had called in sick. If the government had been open, they would normally have received their paychecks on Friday, but for weeks their representatives and union leaders had warned that they were distracted at work — worried about how to put food on the table. Delays spread to other airports, including to the Washington DC area and to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, one of the world’s busiest. The tension — and now danger — in the air was captured that morning by the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, who tweeted: “Stop endangering the safety, security and well-being of our nation. Re-open government now!” Shortly after 2 p.m., Mr. Trump announced that the government w...

January 31, 2019 The Indian Express Shubhajit Roy A day after Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood  Qureshi called up All Parties Hurriyat Conference chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq   to brief him on his government’s “efforts… to highlight” the Kashmir issue, Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale told Pakistan High Commissioner Sohail Mahmood that such actions are a “direct interference” in India’s internal affairs. Advertising After summoning the Pakistan’s envoy at 10.30 pm Wednesday to his South Block office, Gokhale told Mahmood that New Delhi expects Pakistan to “desist” from such actions and “cautioned that (the) persistence of such behaviour… will have implications”. During the 10-minute meeting, an official statement by the MEA said, the Foreign Secretary conveyed the government’s “condemnation in the strongest terms of this latest brazen attempt by Pakistan to subvert India’s unity and to violate our sovereignty and territorial integrity, by none other ...

January 31,2019 The Indian Express Maneck Davar Minister  Arun Jaitley ’s condemnation of investigative adventurism is a clear message not just to the CBI but for all the enforcement arms of the government. It is not an effort to protect anyone or interfere in the autonomy of the investigative process. In the context of this government’s much-vaunted efforts to improve the ease of doing business, this is a seminal statement. Amongst all the parameters, businesses cannot exist and flourish in a state of constant apprehension and dread of the capriciousness of the arms of law and regulatory agencies. This discourages investment and entrepreneurship, which has the cascading effect of low growth and poor job creation. The many amendments to the Companies Act, increasing a host of compliances, has made the task of independent directors so onerous that many professionals refuse board appointments leading to a paucity of leadership at the top. In the present case of ICICI, this ...

By Anjana Thampi and Ishan Anand The Wire,January 30, 2019 Latest employment data once again reinforces the distress about the job situation in India. The Centre for Monitoring the Indian Economy reported a loss of 1.1 crore jobs in 2018 and estimated that the unemployment rate reached a 15-month high of 7.4% in December 2018. The Labour Bureau also recorded a continuous rise in unemployment from 3.4% in 2014 to 3.7% in 2015 and 3.9% in 2016-17.  Rising unemployment poses a serious challenge, even more so because the brunt of joblessness falls more heavily on some groups. The 2015 Labour Bureau Employment-Unemployment Survey throws some light on this.  The youth and the well-educated face the highest unemployment rates, as highlighted in Azim Premji University’s 2018 ‘State of Working India’ report.  The unemployment rate (usual principal and subsidiary status) among the youth (15-25 years) is 12.5%, much higher than any other age group (Graph 1)....

By C Raja Mohan The Indian Express January 29, 2019 At last week’s talks with the Taliban in Doha, the US reportedly put the withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan on the table. America may pull out over an 18-month period after an agreement is signed with the Taliban. In return, the Taliban has apparently assured that Afghanistan will not be used for attacks against America and its allies. Delhi is certainly not alone in being both sceptical about the prospects for these talks and concerned about their success. For, there are not many who vouch for the Taliban’s trustworthiness. And American military presence since 2002 has allowed the construction of a modernising Afghanistan and let India deepen its engagement. This is not a moment, however, for Delhi to stand by and criticise or call for ideal solutions. It is about preparing for significant change in Afghanistan — for good or bad. After the Doha talks, the US special representative, Zalmay Khalilzad, tweeted abo...

By Rahul Tripathi The Indian Express January 29, 2019 Fake News on social media, across the globe, is going to be the next big challenge for cyber security companies as it is “complicated” believes Udi Mokady, chairman and CEO of CyberArk, the second biggest cyber security solutions company in Israel. Advertising Mokady, who served with Israel Defence Forces, before setting up CyberArk says, “We have witnessed media (being) attacked by nation states to reveal their sources. We do not have a solution for fake news. It(the situation) is going to be complicated and challenging as new technology can manipulate videos and can transmit with leaders (political) saying something and them being projected as something else. To filter fake news, one will have to rely more on human intelligence than computers.” Israel, with hostile neighbours, is second after United States on perception of cyber attacks as a threat. It is also among the countries with which New Delhi has cl...

By Anirudha Bahal cobrapost.com January29, 2019 In what appears to be the biggest banking scam in Indian history, the primary promoters of DHFL have been found to have siphoned off more than Rs. 31,000 crore of public money. The scam has primarily been pulled off through grants of loans and advances to shell companies and by using other means. Money has also been routed through these dubious companies and parked outside India, to acquire assets. Cobrapost has unearthed the scam by closely analyzing documents available with public authorities and information available in public domain. By closely scrutinizing public records available with public authorities and information available in public domain, Cobrapost has unearthed a financial scam where the primary promoters of Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Limited (DHFL) and their associate companies have committed a systemic fraud in broad daylight to siphon off public money amounting to more than Rs. 31,000 crore. The ...