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Dawn.com Update March 24, 2018 Russia is supporting and supplying arms to the Taliban, Gen John Nicholson, the head of US forces in Afghanistan, told the  BBC  in an interview . Nicholson, during the interview published on Friday, said he had seen "destabilizing activity by the Russians", alleging that Russian weapons were smuggled across the Tajik border to the Taliban. He, however, did not say in what quantity. "We see a narrative that's being used that grossly exaggerates the number of Isis [Islamic State group] fighters here," Gen Nicholson was quoted as saying by the  BBC . "This narrative then is used as a justification for the Russians to legitimise the actions of Taliban and provide some degree of support to the Taliban." "We've had stories written by the Taliban that have appeared in the media about financial support provided by the enemy," he added. "We've had weapons brought to this headquarters and given...

The Economic Times ET Bureau, Yogima Seth Sharma, Kritika Suneja NEW DELHI: The government will have a brand new set of employment numbers to flash before the next general elections in 2019, which will highlight job creation.  Under the first of its kind massive survey, which starts on the first week of April, the government wants to track employment generation in micro, small and medium enterprises that are currently out of the coverage of the social security net.  The survey will give special attention to enterprises with less than 10 employees, and it is likely to be ready in a year’s time.  The government reckons that computing data for employment generation in the unorganised sector will significantly push the overall employment generation numbers in the country and help in countering the allegations of jobless growth.  As per the seventh quarterly employment survey, 1.36 lakh jobs were created in the July-October quarter last year across...

The Hindu, March 22, 2018 The measures could target 1,300 products totalling tariffs up to $50 billion President Donald Trump on Thursday directed imposition of tariffs on Chinese products, and restrictions on Chinese investments in America in a move that officials described as “historic” and is meant to push back against “economic aggression”. A senior administration official said these measures mark a fundamental change in the current American approach towards Beijing that started with the Richard Nixon-Henry Kissinger era. That approach of trying to get China into the global market as a fair partner has failed, the official said. He said previous Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama failed in their initiatives with China, and so did Mr. Trump’s early overtures towards China. “The President (Mr. Trump) tried to resolve these issues through dialogue but China has a different approach,” he said. The measures follow the completion of a special assessment of C...

The Telegraph India, March 22, 2018 The Supreme Court on Wednesday said the government must address concerns that its aggressive push for Aadhaar cards wouldn't lead to "mass surveillance" and "stalking" and wondered why the Singapore model of individual chip cards couldn't be adopted in India too. "In the name of security and securing things... you can't have a stalking culture," Chief Justice Dipak Misra told attorney-general K.K. Venugopal, while referring to submissions by some petitioners. The constitution bench, which also included Justices A.K. Sikri, A.M. Khanwilkar, D.Y. Chandrachud and Ashok Bhushan, said the government must address apprehensions that "authentication and aggregation of data would lead to mass surveillance". "Why do you want to store data when you only want the identity of the person to be established?" Justice Sikri asked before citing the example of Singapore. In Singapore, the judg...

Dawn, March 22, Islamabad Grand Mufti of Al-Azhar University in Egypt Dr Shawki Ibrahim said on Wednesday that only courts could declare a person infidel while the state was the only authority to declare jihad. Endorsing the Paigham-i-Pakistan, a document issued by the government which offers a unanimous counter-narrative to extremist ideas by collating fatwas (edicts) against terrorism, he said extremism leading to terrorism, blasphemy and declaring any Muslim a non-believer were prohibited in Islam. “Groups like Daesh (the militant Islamic State) have strayed away from the message of Islam but they are targeting Muslim youths through social media,” Dr Ibrahim said while addressing a roundtable conference titled ‘Paigham-i-Pakistan and terrorism’ organised by the Council of Islamic Ideology. Calls for using modern tools of information to counter extremism The conference discussed the practical aspect of the Paigham-i-Pakistan to eradicate extremism and noted that...

The Hindu Business Line, March 21, 2018 Exporters have urged the Reserve Bank of India to reconsider the ban on letters of undertaking (LoUs), which was triggered by the $2 billion fraud at the Punjab National Bank, as it was causing distress to players in sectors such as textiles and leather and increasing their operating costs. “With some banks deciding to cancel LoUs that have already been issued, the situation has become worse as exporters do not have enough cash to pay upfront for their imports,” said Ajay Sahai, Director-General, FIEO. An LoU is a guarantee given by one bank to another to repay a loan on behalf of a client and which allows the client to raise short-term credit to mainly pay for an import. FIEO, an umbrella body representing a number of export organisations, has written to the RBI requesting its intervention in extending help to exporters hit by the move to ban LoUs. In the letter, FIEO has asked the RBI to consider introducing LoUs with safeguards a...

The Indian Express, By: ENS Economic Bureau | Mumbai |  March 22, 2018  Banks have rejected the takeover bids by Numetal — a venture formed by Russian lender VTB Bank and Rewant Ruia — and LN Mittal’s ArcelorMittal for Essar Steel, saying that both the bidders are ineligible under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) which categorically stated that promoters of defaulting companies are not allowed to bid unless he or she repays all pending loans before submitting the resolution plan. The committee of creditors (CoC) of Essar Steel which met here on Wednesday decided to reject both the bids and decided to allow a second round of bidding for the debt-laden steel company on April 2. Numetal and ArcelorMittal which were the only two bidders for Essar Steel submitted their bids on February 12 and both were challenging the eligibility of the other party to bid for the company. Both were declared ineligible by the lenders under Section 29 A of the amended I...

The Hindu Business Line,   MUMBAI, MARCH 21 A phased rollout of corporate governance norms suggested by the Uday Kotak committee, disclosure of debt default by listed companies and structuring of a pension scheme of its employees are on top of the agenda for the SEBI board meeting on March 28. In the wake of the PNB loan scam and subsequent instances of companies trying to delay default disclosure, SEBI is considering a proposal to force corporate borrowers to report all defaults above  ₹ 5 crore if repayment is delayed by over 30 days, two people aware of the matter said. In August, SEBI had made it mandatory for companies to disclose any instance of a default on the payment of interest or repayment of principal to banks or financial institutions within a day of the default. The regulator had said that while current regulations required listed companies to disclose delay or default in payment of interest/principal on debt securities, there was no such requirem...

The Hindu, March 21, 2018 Cambridge Analytica has been accused of using personal data of Facebook users Days after data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica (CA), a subsidiary of the U.K.-based SCL Group, was suspended by social media company Facebook for not deleting user data obtained from an app developer for the platform, the controversy reached Indian shores with both the BJP and the Congress trading charges of the other having used the firm’s services. Union Law and Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad questioned the links between the firm and the Congress at a press conference on Wednesday. Ahead of 2019 polls Citing media reports, he said the Congress engaged the firm for its campaign for the 2019 general election. Mr. Prasad raised questions about the extent of the party’s engagement with the firm and how far the Congress endorsed CA’s use of “sex, sleaze and fake news to influence elections.” The Minister was alluding to an investiga...

SME Times News Bureau | 20 Mar, 2018 Sounding a warning that over five billion people across the globe may run into water shortage, a United Nations report has pointed out that dams in India have done more harm than good to the cause of water security. Suggesting natural solutions to handle the water crisis, the UN World Water Development Report, 2018, notes that large-scale water development projects have led to major impacts like human displacement, and achieved only limited food security -- one of the main objectives of such projects. The report lays emphasis on the importance of "nature-based solutions" to meet the crisis, and calls for ancestral and indigenous solutions. "The World Commission on Dams country study on India concluded that a century or more of large-scale water development had resulted in major social and ecological impacts, including substantial human displacement, soil erosion and widespread waterlogging while, contrary to state...