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 The Hindu October 12, 2020 China announced on Sunday that it was providing a $90 million grant to Sri Lanka, two days after the island nation’s President sought help from a visiting Chinese delegation in disproving a perception that China-funded megaprojects are “debt traps.” Calling the financial assistance a “timely grant,” the Chinese Embassy in Colombo said that it would be used for medical care, education and water supplies in Sri Lanka’s rural areas. and that it would “contribute to the well-being of (Sri Lankans) in a post-COVID era.” s The announcement follows a visit to the Indian Ocean island nation on Friday by a Chinese delegation led by Yang Jiechi, a Communist Party Politburo member and a former Foreign Minister. During talks with Mr. Yang, Sri Lankan President Gotabhaya Rajapaksa asked China to help him in disproving a perception that China-funded megaprojects are “debt traps” aimed at gaining influence in local affairs. Crucial link: China considers Sri Lanka to be a c

 The Hindu October 12, 2020 China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi has called for a new forum to defuse tensions in the West Asia after a meeting with his Iranian counterpart where he reiterated Beijing’s support for Tehran. Mr. Wang and Javad Zarif also reaffirmed their commitment to Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, according to the Chinese Foreign Ministry, an implicit rebuke of the U.S. for abandoning the accord during their Saturday meeting in China’s southwestern Tengchong city. Iran has been locked in an acrimonious relationship with Saudi Arabia, the other major West Asian power, over the war in Yemen, Iranian influence in Iraq and Saudi support for Washington’s sanctions on Tehran. “China proposes to build a regional multilateral dialogue platform with equal participation of all stakeholders,” said the Chinese Foreign Ministry statement. The forum would “enhance mutual understanding through dialogue and explore political and diplomatic solutions to security issues in the W

 Moneycontrol October 12, 2020 Research conducted at the KU Leuven Rega Institute in Belgium has found that the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) does not limit the multiplication of the novel coronavirus. However, a very high dose of the flu drug favipiravir does have antiviral efficacy, according to their results. The researchers gave the hamsters either hydroxychloroquine or favipiravir for four to five days, according to the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) of the United States. Hamsters are often chosen as test subjects because they closely resemble the human body's reaction to an experimental drug. Coronavirus vaccine tracker October 9 | Check out the latest developments from around the world. "No toxicity signs were observed in the clinical presentation of the hamsters treated with these high doses. Importantly, significant improvements of histological lung pathology were observed in hamsters treated with the medium

 The Indian Express October 12, 2020 Coordination Committee (CorCom), an umbrella group of  militant groups operating in Manipur has called for a total shutdown on October 15 denouncing the “forceful” merger of the state with India which took place in 1949 . A statement issued by the outfit said the total shutdown will come into effect from 6am to 6pm. It appealed the people to suspend all businesses, official work, movement during the shutdown period and urged them to observe the ‘National Black Day’ in protest against the annexation of Manipur by India. However, essential services like medical will be exempted from the purview of the shutdown, it said. On October 15, 1949 Manipur was declared part of India after the then King of Manipur signed the Merger Agreement on September 21, in the same year in Shillong. However, insurgent groups in Manipur contend that the King was made to sign the ‘Merger Agreement” under duress. As such, the insurgent groups have been observing October 15 as

 The Indian Express October 12, 2020 Indian democracy has been at full play in reaction to the new farm laws. While the government hailed it as a historic decision — I tend to agree with that — the Opposition parties described the passing of these farm laws as “a dark day for farmers” and a “sell out to corporate sharks”. What amused me the most was how everyone’s heart was suddenly bleeding for the farmer. I could, however, see that both sides of the political spectrum want farmers’ incomes to increase. The Opposition parties want to ensure that through higher and more effective MSP (minimum support prices), while the government is offering greater choices to farmers through markets, without demolishing the existing MSP system. Having analysed the MSP business over decades, let me say clearly that the regime was the creation of the era of scarcity in the mid-1960s. Indian agriculture has, since then, turned the corner from scarcity to surplus. The policy instruments of dealing with sh

 The Indian Express October 12, 2020 Kishore Biyani-led Future Retail’s Rs 24,713 crore deal to sell its retail, wholesale, logistics and warehousing units to Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Retail and Fashionstyle, has run into legal trouble with global e-commerce giant Amazon claiming its “contractual rights” have been violated. What is the Future-Reliance deal? In August this year, Biyani’s Future Group entered into an agreement with Reliance Retail, a subsidiary of the umbrella Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) group, to sell its retail, wholesale, logistics and warehousing to the latter. As a part of the deal, Future Retail will sell its supermarket chain Big Bazaar, premium food supply unit Foodhall and fashion and clothes supermart Brand Factory’s retail as well as wholesale units to Reliance Retail. The Future group was under immense pressure from its lenders, led by the State Bank of India, to manage its debt, and the deal in seen as a bid by the group to cut down on the same. Before

 The Indian Express October 13, 2020 AS THE pandemic struck, and the government imposed a nationwide lockdown, the country woke up to countless images of migrant workers returning to their villages with their children, on cycles, buses, lorries and trains, many walking hundreds of kilometres. But as the economic distress began to sink in, a more sinister movement of children gathered pace — of those being taken away from their homes for illegal labour, trafficking and forced marriages. The crisis led to a spike in “interventions” where officials or aid workers stepped in to rescue children in distress, and exposed an ill-equipped government apparatus with too many holes to stem the flow, let alone prevent it, an investigation of Childline data obtained by The Indian Express has found. Consider some of the key findings: # Between March and August, officials manning 1098, the national childline for distress calls set up by the Ministry for Women and Child Development, tracked 1.92 lakh i

 The Indian Express October 13, 2020 The biggest news of the past week was the monetary policy review. The October review was delayed because the Central government had not been able to nominate its quota of three members to the Monetary Policy Committee of the Reserve Bank of India. Given that retail inflation — the variable RBI’s MPC is mandated to target by law — has stayed above the comfort zone for the most part since December last year, it was expected that the MPC will decide to wait before cutting repo rate (the rate at which India’s central bank lends money to the banking system) further. Going into the meeting, however, the two more substantive issues were RBI’s assessment of how bad will the hit be to the GDP growth rate this financial year, as well as what is the outlook on inflation. On inflation, the RBI expects a steady decline. “CPI inflation is projected at 6.8 per cent for Q2:2020-21, at 5.4-4.5 per cent for H2:2020-21 and 4.3 per cent for Q1:2021-22,” stated the poli