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Business Standard Mihir S Sharma  May 17, 2018  While glitches attended its roll-out and the tax is not as simple as originally planned, many hope the GST Council will stabilise the tax and improve the tax-GDP ratio The scale of Narendra Modi's victory in the Lok Sabha elections four years ago, on May 16, 2014, was such that many observers believed a long-delayed course of economic reform would be implemented, using an unprecedented Lok Sabha majority in recent years. In the years since, Modi's government has lived up to expectations in terms of the amount of energy it has brought to policymaking — but its record is divided between hits and misses. Hits Politically, Modi's most important economic achievement has been the taming  inflation  since 2014. In this, his government has been helped by the collapse in oil prices since he took office, and that has reduced prices all-round. But the government has also been careful about increasing minimum sup...

Cyberscoop Patrick Howell O Neil may 15, 2018 Security researchers discovered two pieces of malware used by the Pakistani military in order to spy on specific targets in the Middle East, Afghanistan and India, according to the mobile security company Lookout. The malware, dubbed Stealth Mango and Tangelo, appears to have successfully compromised government officials, medical professionals and civilians in Afghanistan, India, Iraq, Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Pakistan. Targets were compromised via Android and possibly iOS. Government officials in the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom and Iran were indirectly compromised after interacting with direct Stealth Mango victims. Instead of sophisticated and expensive exploits, attackers relied on phishing through third-party app stores and possibly physical access to targeted devices. The campaign was ongoing as of April 2018. The malware, developed by independent contractors, is constantly being updated. D...

Business Line   PTI MAY 15, 2018 Free banking services like cheque book issuance and ATM withdrawals is likely to remain out of the ambit of the GST, a senior finance ministry official said. The Department of Financial Services had approached its revenue counterpart to clear the confusion over the levy of Goods and Services Tax (GST) on some of the free services offered by banks to their customers. “The revenue department is likely to tell the financial services department that GST will not be levied on free banking services,” an official told PTI. Amid banks getting service tax notice for non-payment of the levy on free services, the Department of Financial Services (DFS) had approached the revenue department seeking clarity on whether such services would attract GST. The DFS was of the opinion that services such as issuance of cheque books, account statements and ATM withdrawals are free up to a certain limit and not commercial activities which cannot be brought ...

Business Line TV JAYAN, May 15, 2018 Identify ‘missing link’ in biosynthesis of vinblastine An ornamental plant commonly found in India and elsewhere may emerge as the source of one of the largest-selling anti-cancer drugs, vinblastine, with a team of researchers from the UK helping find missing genes involved in the biosynthesis of the chemical. Sixty years ago, two Canadian scientists studying the anti-diabetic properties of the Madagascar periwinkle, known as  nithyakalyani  in Tamil and  sadabahar  in Hindi, stumbled upon its anti-cancer properties. This led to the discovery of vinblastine and vincristine, used to treat various cancers. Six-decade mystery Since then, many scientific groups have worked tirelessly to unravel the cellular mechanisms involved in the production of these valuable chemical compounds. They met with only partial success, as many enzymes involved in their biosynthesis were still missing. The complex chemical mechani...

Business Line SHIKHA T MALIK, May14, 2018 Leptospirosis - caused by pathogenic bacteria, Leptospira - led to over one million infections globally in 2015. Availability of an appropriate vaccine could have prevented most of them. Scientists at the Gujarat Biotechnology Research Centre (GBRC) have used sophisticated tools to identify important regions on the bacteria that could play an important role in developing a vaccine for Leptospirosis. Leptospirosis is a zoonotic disease, meaning it spreads through animals. Farmers or veterinarians frequently exposed to animal urine or swimmers exposed to contaminated water are at high risk. People may get exposed to the bacteria during flooding as well. Vaccinating such high risk groups can protect them from Leptospirosis.  The team at GBRC used high throughput computational tools to identify regions on pathogenic Leptospira, which could be critical in designing an effective vaccine. Using, bioinformatics tools, researchers stu...

Business Line, By  K R SRIVATS, May 14, 2018 Punjab National Bank (PNB) on Monday divested responsibilities of two of its current Executive Directors—Brahmaji Rao and Sanjiv Sharan—named in the CBI chargesheet filed on the Nirav Modi perpetrated fraud. This move came on the heels of the Finance Ministry writing a letter to the PNB suggesting “appropriate decision”, a PNB spokesperson said. The Finance Ministry has also sent a formal communique to Allahabad Bank Board for an appropriate decision on its current MD & CEO Usha Ananthasubramanian, who was former CEO of Punjab National Bank and named in the CBI chargesheet filed in the Nirav Modi case on Monday. Ananthasubramanian headed PNB between August 2015 and May 2017.She had also served as an Executive Director at PNB between July 2011 and November 2013. The Allahabad Bank Board is expected to meet on Tuesday to take a decision on divesting of her responsibilities as MD & CEO of the bank. Reference:...

The Business Line PTI   NEW DELHI, MAY 13, 2018 The Government will link additional 200 wholesale mandis to the online trading platform eNAM this fiscal and also encourage inter-mandi transactions, Agriculture Secretary SK Pattanayak has said. At present, 585 regulated mandis in 14 States are linked with the electronic National Agriculture Market (eNAM) launched in April 2016. “There were initial hiccups but those have been overcome. The eNAM system is now more established. Farmers are very happy and more States have started showing interest,” Pattanayak said. Though the target is to connect 200 more mandis to the eNAM platform this year, the priority will be given to improve the quality and encourage inter-mandi online trading, he said. “We will focus on quality. Once the inter-mandi system is in place, we can link more mandis,” he noted. eNAM platform Online trading on the eNAM platform can be done through the website, trading platform or the mobile App availab...

The Economics Times Bloomberg  May 15, 2018 SAN FRANCISCO: Facebook Inc said it took down 583 million fake profiles in the first three months of the year, usually within minutes of their creation.  The social network also scrubbed 837 million pieces of spam and acted on 2.5 million instances of hate speech, it said on Tuesday in its first ever report on how effectively it’s enforcing community standards.  Facebook came under intense scrutiny earlier this year over the use of private data and the impact of harmful content on its 2.2 billion monthly users, with governments around the world questioning the company’s policies. Tuesday’s report, which will come out twice a year, can also show how well Facebook’s artificial intelligence systems learn to flag items that violate the rules before anyone on the site can see them.  The conclusion from the first metrics: some problems are better suited to computerized solutions than others. Almost 100% of the...

The Hindu AFP, May 15, 2018 Group to relocate to Berlin, blames repressive policies of Prime Minister Victor Orbán government The foundation run by U.S.-Hungarian billionaire George Soros said on Tuesday that it was closing operations in Hungary and relocating to Germany in response to the “repressive” policies of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s government. “Faced with an increasingly repressive political and legal environment in Hungary, the Open Society Foundations (OSF) are moving their Budapest-based international operations and staff to the German capital, Berlin,” said the network. Mr. Orbán, reelected last month for a third consecutive term in office, has long accused Mr. Soros and non-governmental organisations he funds of orchestrating immigration and plotting to undermine the cultural fabric of Europe. “We won’t be shedding any crocodile tears,” the government’s press office said on Tuesday, reacting to the departure. ‘Stop Soros’ package OSF said the de...

The Indian Express By: Express News Service May 16, 2018  Rishi, in his plea, said he was detained at the IGI airport on his arrival on March 15 and was asked by the CBI to appear before it in Mumbai the next day. A former director of diamantaire  Nirav Modi’s  company moved the Delhi High Court on Tuesday, seeking to quash a Look Out Circular (LOC) issued against him after the lodging of an FIR by the CBI in the PNB fraud case. Justice Rajiv Shakdher sought response of the CBI on the plea by Sanjay Rishi, an Overseas Citizen of India residing in the United States, seeking direction to the authorities to withdraw the LOC. Rishi, president of American Express for South Asia, was appointed as a non-executive independent director of Nirav Modi’s Firestar International Ltd on December 6, 2016, and he had resigned from the post on February 7 this year. He said he had not taken part in the day-to-day affairs of the company. The plea was opposed by CBI advocate...