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Live Mint Dated April 13, 2020 By  Stephen Kalin and Alexander Cornwell Saudi Arabia   indefinitely extended a curfew due to the coronavirus on Sunday amid a surge of new infections, and the United Arab Emirates warned of possible action against countries refusing to allow migrant workers to be repatriated. Since placing the capital Riyadh and other big cities under 24-hour curfew on Monday, Saudi Arabia has reported more than 300 new cases per day. The nationwide curfew, initially set for three weeks, runs from 3 p.m. to 6 a.m everywhere else. For both this and the 24-hour curfew, residents may go out only for essential needs. The interior ministry announced new permits for vital personnel to move around. Violators face fines and jail time. Saudi Arabia has recorded 4,462 infections with 59 deaths, the highest among the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, where the total neared 14,100 with 96 deaths. It expects it could reach 200,000 cases in coming week...

Hindustan Times Dated :April 13, 2020 Sutirtho Patranobis China reported 97 new imported Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours, the highest in a single day with more than half of the cases reports said stemming from a Russian flight to Shanghai the day before. No death was reported on Saturday in China. The sharp rise in imported cases in China daily over the weekend was preceded by several African ambassadors in China writing to the country’s foreign ministry to address their concerns over the reported discrimination of Africans in the southern city of Guangzhou hours after African Union Commission lodged a formal protest on the issue in Johannesburg with Chinese diplomats. On Saturday, the African Union Commission Chairperson also tweeted that his office had summoned the Chinese envoy to the AU over the recent reports. “My Office invited the Chinese Ambassador to the AU, Mr Liu Yuxi, to express our extreme concern at allegations of maltreatment of Africans in Guangzho...

Hindustan Times Dated: April 13, 2020 By Amrita Madhukalya The textile ministry has procured 130,000 coverall suits from Indian producers amid a shortage of the protective gear being used by health care workers while treating coronavirus disease patients. According to officials familiar with the matter, the producers have reached a daily production capacity of 22,000 units. Since domestic production of the PPE suits began last month, 33 Indian producers have passed the quality tests laid down under norms stipulated by the WHO. Earlier, the country relied on international players for the for the suits. “This is a significant achievement considering that we had started from nowhere a month back, and the fabric had to be developed in the country for the first time. We hope to touch 50,000 units daily in the coming week, which will stabilise the supply chain,” said a senior textile ministry official, on condition of anonymity. The daily production capacity for the suits...

Live Mint  Dated April 13, 2020 By Dhirendra Tripathi The government has taken note of China’s central bank raising its stake in Housing Development Finance Corporation Limited (HDFC), India’s largest mortgage lender, and is unhappy no red flag was raised over it, according to a source familiar with the development. HDFC informed the stock exchanges Saturday about People’s Bank of China (PBOC) raising its stake to 1.01% from 0.8%. Even as there is no law barring investment by the Chinese central bank in any Indian entity, the news has ruffled a few feathers in the finance ministry. PBOC’s 1.01% stake comprises 17.49 million shares of HDFC. The lender wasn’t required by law to disclose the Chinese central bank’s 0.8% stake in it but with the 1% threshold breached, the home loan lender has complied with the regulations. It was a secondary market transaction and thus HDFC had no role in the deal. “No less an institution than a central bank of the world’s second largest ...

The Indian Express Dated : April 13,2020 Even as the 21-day lockdown till April 14 appears set to be extended by two weeks, both the Centre and the states are agreed that the blanket restrictions on production and movement will not apply to farm-related work. Agriculture would, indeed, be the most significant, if not the only, economic activity the country might see at least till the end of this month. The government’s focus, too, will now have to be as much on the rabi crop’s harvesting and marketing as on keeping the war against the novel  coronavirus  going. But harvesting per se is unlikely to be a problem. The bulk of the mustard, chana (chickpea), masur (red lentil), sugarcane, potato and rabi onions have already been harvested. It’s only wheat and some seasonal vegetables (the likes of bottle gourd, okra, brinjal and cucumber) and fruit (mango and melons) that are still in the fields. Harvesting of rabi maize, summer moong (green gram) or even Dasheri, Chaunsa a...

First Post Dated: April 15,2020 Indicating that prolonged lockdown to contain coronavirus spread may lead to job cuts in the Indian IT industry, NASSCOM former president R Chandrashekhar has said that the work-from-home culture may become a positive development in the long run as it opens up newer avenues and save investments by IT firms. The former bureaucrat also said startups which are surviving on funds infused by venture capitalists may face tougher situations if the present scenario deteriorates. "The larger companies may not be actually cutting jobs for two reasons," he said. "One is that they do not want to lose their employees and they have money to pay." "Many of them [big companies], even if they do shed some jobs it might be at the [level of] people who are the temporary or intern type. But they would not want regular and permanent employees to go. So as long as they have sufficient flexibility in their books, they would continue. But ...

First Post Dated: April 15, 2020 The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) has suggested the Home Ministry to allow limited activity in certain sectors such as heavy electricals and telecom equipment with reasonable safeguards. In a letter to Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla, the department said that these activities are essential to improve the economic situation and provide liquidity in the hands of the people. "It is felt that certain more activities with reasonable safeguards should be allowed once a final decision regarding extension and nature of lockdown is taken by the central government," it said. The exit plan from the lockdown is recommended after getting suggestions from a detailed interaction with various states and industry bodies. The department has suggested that industries which can be allowed to operate must ensure single entry points for workers, sufficient space for ensuring social distancing, use of separate trans...

Hindustan Times  Dated: April 13, 2020 Prime Minister Imran Khan on Sunday urged the global community to launch an initiative to give debt relief to developing countries that are fighting the novel coronavirus, as Pakistan reported nearly 450 fresh cases, bringing the total number of the COVID-19 patients to 5,230. In a video message, Khan said that highly indebted countries are facing a “lack of fiscal space” that was inhibiting their efforts to prevent the coronavirus from spreading and, at the same time, providing relief to people. “The Global Initiative on Debt Relief will bring together stakeholders on a platform to promote coordinated health and economic response,” he said. Noting that COVID-19 posed  unprecedented health and economic challenges , Khan underlined that a global recession worse than the Great Depression was certain. He noted that during the past week, various announcements have been made by multilateral actors such as the UN, the Internatio...

The Print Dated : April 12, 2020 India is likely to record its worst growth performance since the 1991 liberalisation this fiscal year as the coronavirus outbreak severely disrupts the economy, the World Bank said on Sunday. India’s economy is expected to grow 1.5 per cent to 2.8 per cent in the 2020-21 fiscal which started on April 1, the World Bank said in its South Asia Economic Focus report. It estimated India will grow 4.8 per cent to 5 per cent in the 2019-20 fiscal that ended on March 31. The COVID-19 outbreak came at a time when India’s economy was already slowing due to persistent financial sector weaknesses, the report said. To contain it, the government imposed a lockdown, shutting factories and businesses, suspending flights, stopping trains and restricting mobility of goods and people. “The resulting domestic supply and demand disruptions (on the back of weak external demand) are expected to result in a sharp growth deceleration in FY21 (April 2020 to...

Business Line Dated: April 13,2020 By Rahul Wadke March, April and May are crucial months for preparation of the kharif season, which produces the largest quantity of foodgrains in the country. There is a fear in the market that the coronavirus pandemic has put a spanner in those preparations, especially for the seeds and agri-chemicals sectors. Senior agriculture consultant and thought-leader Jagadeesh Sunkad believes that if the lockdown is lifted by early May, there still would be enough time to prepare for the kharif season. Since the agriculture sector has already been exempted from the lockdown, the impact will not be devastating. However, Sunkad, who has consulted for multi-lateral institution Asian Development Bank and Murugappa Group, believes that due to the pandemic, agricultural input and output supply chains, which are traditionally dominated by wealthy rural families, would get distributed. In the medium term of the next three to five seasons, their roles will dim...