India

New Delhi, Aug 30 (IANS) Congress G-23 leaders Prithviraj Chavan, Anand Sharma and Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Tuesday met Ghulam Nabi Azad, who has resigned from the party and is going to hold his first public meeting in Jammu in September's first week.

The G-23 leaders are understood to be planning to contest the Presidential polls of the party which is slated on October 17.

Former Union Minister Shashi Tharoor, who is likely to throw his hat into the ring, however said that: "Let's wait for sometime." Sources say Tharoor and former Maharashtra Chief Minister Chavan are likely candidates who could challenge the Gandhis' candidate.

With Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot emerging as front runner for the Congress President, being seen as choice of interim chief Sonia Gandhi, even as some want the return of Rahul Gandhi - with Gehlot too proposing his name, the G-23 was understood to have made up its mind to field a candidate if no Gandhi stood.

However, it remained to be seen if it would do so as it seemed unlikely as Sonia Gandhi's choice would be challenged.

The last time the election was conducted for the Congress President's post was in 2000 when Jitendra Prasada had challenged Sonia Gandhi but lost.

--IANS
miz/vd

Kolkata, Aug 30 (IANS) All the primary teachers' recruitments in West Bengal done by the West Bengal Board of Primary Education (WBBPE), through teacher eligibility test (TET) since 2011, are under the scanner of the central agencies like the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Enforcement Directorate (ED).

The ED had sought the documents of all the recruitments done through TET since 2011 from the WBBPE. ED sources said that the documents has been sought from the joint director level officer of the agency. Accordingly, the WBBPE has sought these details from the different district primary education councils and asked them to send the files in this matter latest by September 1.

ED sources said that their sleuths will examine each file of recruitment done through TET since 2011 and identify whether there had been irregularities in the appointments made.

Already the CBI and the ED are conducting parallel probes in the matter following a directive of the Calcutta High Court's single- judge bench of Justice Abhijit Gangopadhyay. He also ordered the immediate removal of the Trinamool Congress legislator, Manik Bhattacharya from the chair of WBBPE President.

--IANS
src/vd

Udaipur, Aug 30 (IANS) India is no longer weak and has become the most powerful country in the world, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said here on Tuesday.

Speaking after unveiling a statue of Panna Dai, a 16th-century nursemaid, the Defence Minister also said that the Russia-Ukraine war was stopped for a few hours at the behest of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and hence the government could bring back over 22,000 Indian students from the war-torn region.

"Such an incident will never be repeated in the future," he said after unveiling the 9.6 feet tall statue.

Panna Dai is known sacrificing her son to safeguard the future of Mewar in Rajasthan. When Mewar scion Udai Singh was left in her care after Rani Karnavati committed 'Jauhar' in 1535, he was attacked by his uncle Banvir. It was Panna Dai who sacrificed her own son's life to save Udai Singh.

Speaking on the occasion, Rajnath Singh said, "I consider myself lucky to have unveiled this statue. The story of Panna Dai's sacrifice is known to all. I was also touched by her bravery and valour."

"India has not invaded any country till date, nor has it occupied any place. However, if someone looks at our country with an evil eye, we give a befitting reply," he added.

Speaking about the country's armed forces, the Defnce Minister said, "We will soon stop buying arms and ammunition from other countries, as everything will be manufactured in India. Presently, we are selling weapons worth Rs 13,000 crore. Eight years ago, this figure was only Rs 900 crore. By 2047, it will go up to Rs 2.75 lakh crore."

"'Amrit Kaal' is ending in 2047, which will take another 25 years. By 2047, India will become a 'Vishwaguru'," he added.

Praising Rajasthan, he said the soil of the state tells the story of women with valour, as he remembered the sacrifices made by Panna Dai and Hadi Rani, among others.

Hadi Rani was a brave queen of Rajasthan, who sacrificed her life to motivate her husband to go to a battle.

Remembering Panna Dai, Singh said, "She did not worry about being called a 'kumata', as she sacrificed her own son. She had only one goal -- to safeguard the kingdom of Mewar."

Union Minister of State Krishan Pal Singh Gurjar was also present for the event, which was attended by all the MPs and MLAs from Udaipur district.

The event was originally scheduled to be held in June, but it had to be postponed due to the protests against the Agnipath scheme for short-term recruitment into the armed forces.

--IANS
arc/arm

Mumbai, Aug 30 (IANS) The Indian rupee ended 51 paise up at 79.45 against the US dollar as heavy short covering was witnessed in capital markets from FIIs, dealers said.

At the interbank foreign exchange market, rupee ended at 79.45 as against 79.96 against US dollar previously.

Indian markets will be closed on Wednesday on account of Ganesh Chaturthi.

"Rupee gained strongly by 0.40 points as heavy short covering was witnessed in capital markets from FIIs. As benchmark rose 2.50 per cent in Indian capital markets, hence rupee time gained more than 0.50 per cent for the first time in the month of August," said Jateen Trivedi, VP Research Analyst at LKP Securities.

Dollar index, which gauges the the strength of greenback against the basket of six major currencies, was at 108.460.

Brent crude oil prices were at $101.49 a barrel by the closing of Indian market hours.

Sensex ended 1,564.45 points, or 2.70 per cent, up at 59,537.07, and Nifty closed 445.40 points, or 2.58 per cent up at 17,759.30. Nifty bank was up sharply 3.29 per cent.

All the 30 stocks on the Sensex ended in green.

"Going ahead, 80.00 will keep acting as strong support for rupee whereas 79.00 will be tested in the coming session," Trivedi added.

--IANS
msn/vd

Mumbai, Aug 30 (IANS) Benchmark indices ended sharply up on Tuesday after falling sharply on Monday due to delivery-based buying by the FIIs and short covering in the F&O market, dealers said.

At close, Sensex ended 1,564.45 points, or 2.70 per cent, up at 59,537.07, and Nifty closed 445.40 points or 2.58 per cent up at 17,759.30. Nifty bank was up sharply at 3.29 per cent.

All the 30 stocks on the Sensex ended in green.

BSE LargeCap was up 2.59 per cent, BSE MidCap, and BSE SmallCap up 1.97 per cent, and 1.40 per cent, respectively. Bajaj Finserv, Bajaj Finance, IndusInd Bank, Tech Mahindra, and ICICI Bank were major gainers on the BSE.

"Today's rebound indicates the domestic economy's resilience in comparison to its global peers. Although the markets are currently at premium valuations, continued support from foreign investors aided domestic stocks to inch higher. Sectors in swing with the progress of the domestic economy should be able to do well compared to the rest," said Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services.

Volumes on the NSE were the highest in more than a week. Among sectors, realty, power, banks, oil and gas, and auto indices rose the most. Broader market underperformed; however the advance decline ratio was sharply positive at 2.96:1.

Global stocks rose on Tuesday as investors sought bargains following two days of declines as Chinese authorities pledged to stimulate the world's second-largest economy. China will step up measures to boost demand and stabilise employment and prices in the second half of the year to optimise economic outcomes, the country's Finance Ministry said on Tuesday, as policymakers strive to prop up faltering growth.

"Nifty has nullified the bearish signals from the downgap created on the previous day and has filled that downgap. It has closed at the highest ever on monthly charts. It will now face resistance at 17965-17992 band while 17522-17623 band could offer support," said Deepak Jasani, Head of Retail Research, HDFC Securities.

--IANS
msn/vd

By Sanu V. George
Thiruvananthapuram, Aug 30 (IANS) There is never a dull moment when Thiruvananthapuram Congress Lok Sabha MP Shashi Tharoor speaks or writes and it was no different this time when he aired his opinion in a vernacular daily on the need for a contest to the top party post.



As soon as the article became public, it gave rise to speculation that he might throw his hat in the ring to contest for the top post, but on Tuesday he clarified to the media saying: "I never said that I will contest, the rest can be discussed later," said Tharoor before driving away.

Meanwhile, one will have to wait a bit to know if Tharoor is actually in the contest as the last date for filing of the nomination to the top post is September 30, according to the notification that has been brought out by AICC general secretary (organisation) K.C.Venugopal.

Things are likely to become clearer in the coming days as Rahul Gandhi's 'Bharat Jodo Yatra', will kick off from Kanyakumari on September 7 and reach the Kerala border on September 11. It will cover 43 Assembly constituencies and 12 Lok Sabha and will cover 453 kms in 19 days.

A political analyst on condition of anonymity pointed out Tharoor ever since he contested the Lok sabha election in 2009, he has never been a person who has been liked by a huge section of the front line Congress leaders here.

"And this is seen every time he comes to contest the polls, which he won in 2014 and in 2019. The reason why he wins each time is because of his personality and is able to get a sizable vote from the political voters, the youth and also the women voters. The only time women voters left him was at the 2014 Lok Sabha polls as it was held a few months after his wife Sunanda Pushkar died, when his margin of victory fell down from close to a lakh of votes to around 15,000, but Ain 2019, he again won with a margin of over 90,000 votes," said the analyst.

But the analyst points out that at the moment, even though the Congress party in Kerala continues to be headed by faction leaders, there have been no open defiance against the Gandhi family, even though veterans like P.J.Kurien and now estranged K.V.Thomas have expressed some reservation.

"That should be a bother for Tharoor, as veterans like A.K.Antony, Oommen Chandy, Ramesh Chennithala and leaders like K.Sudhakaran (State party president) and Leader of Opposition V.D.Satheesan are most unlikely to go against the Gandhi family. If at all Tharoor decides to contest, he will have to take on the candidate who will have the full blessings of the Gandhis and hence it's anyone's guess that for Tharoor to get votes from his home state party colleagues will be really tough than getting votes from his constituency voters," added the analyst.

So one will have to wait a while to know if Tharoor is actually going to contest or if this was just his routine tongue-in-cheek remarks, which has seen his stock rising.

--IANS
sg/shb/

Islamabad, Aug 30 (IANS) In view of the skyrocketing prices of vegetables amid the ongoing floods and relentless monsoon rain across Pakistan, the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) on Tuesday demanded the government to give permission for vegetable import from neighbouring India through the Wagah border.

LCCI President Nauman Kabir urged the government to grant permission to import vegetables from India to control its prices, Geo News reported.

"The recent floods have destroyed crops of tomato, onion, potato and other vegetables across the country," he said, adding that the crisis is expected to prevail for the next three months.

The vegetable crisis could further worsen in September, October and November, he added.

It will take a few days to transport vegetables from India to Pakistan via the Wagah border, Geo News reported.

The prices of vegetables skyrocketed as the grocery vendors are charging exorbitant prices from consumers amid the countrywide floods triggered by torrential rains.

The traders are making hefty profits at a time when the death toll from the relentless monsoon rains has exceeded the 1,100 mark and inflicting $10 billion loss on the country's economy.

According to the details, tomato is being sold at 250 PKR per kg in the market while its official price is 190 PKR per kg.

Similarly, the vendors are selling onion at 300 PKR to 320 PKR per kg while the commodity's rate was fixed at 290 PKR by the authorities, Geo News reported.

Potatoes are being sold at 120 PKR to 140 PKR per kg instead of its official rate of 100 PKR per kg.

Ginger's official rate is 360 PKR per kg but it is available for 380 PKR per kg in the market.

Garlic is being sold at 250 PKR per kg while its official rate is 200 PKR per kg.

--IANS
san/ksk/

New Delhi, Aug 30 (IANS) Microsoft has announced the general availability of the latest Azure Virtual Machines featuring the Ampere Altra Arm–based processor.

The new virtual machines will be generally available on September 1, and customers can launch them in 10 Azure regions and multiple availability zones around the world, the company said in a statement.

In addition, the Arm-based virtual machines can be included in Kubernetes clusters managed using Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS). This ability has been in preview and will be generally available over the coming weeks in all the regions that offer the new virtual machines.

"Hundreds of customers have tested and experienced firsthand the excellent price-performance that the Arm architecture can provide for web and application servers, open-source databases, microservices, Java and .NET applications, gaming, media servers, and more," said Paul Nash Vice President, Azure Compute Platform.

Azure's Ampere Altra Arm–based virtual machines represent a cost-effective and power-efficient option that does not compromise the level of performance that customers require, said the company.

"The general availability of Microsoft Azure VMs on Arm marks an important milestone in redefining what is possible in cloud computing," said Chris Bergey, SVP and GM, Infrastructure Line of Business, Arm.

All the new virtual machine sizes support up to 40 Gbps of networking bandwidth.

The Ampere Altra Arm–based Azure virtual machines are now available in the US, Europe, Asia and Australia.

"We plan to expand Azure regional availability after September 1," said the company.

--IANS
na/

New Delhi, Aug 30 (IANS) Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has demanded a severe punishment for the criminals who burnt alive a girl in Jharkhand's Dumka.

Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday tweeted in Hindi, "The savagery treatment meted out to Ankita and her death has made every Indian's head hang in shame, she and her family will get justice when the perpetrators of the crime will get severe punishment as fast as possible.

"It's time today to make the atmosphere safer for women."

Class 12 student Ankita was being harassed by a youth who finally burnt her alive by throwing petrol on her after she spurned him and complained against him to her family.

The severely injured Ankita struggled for five days at RIMS in Ranchi before breathing her last late on Saturday night. She was cremated in Dumka on Monday morning. The city of Dumka, the sub-capital of Jharkhand, remained closed for the second day in protest against this incident. Accused Shahrukh, who set Ankita afire, is now in jail, but people are on the streets demanding that he be punished quickly. A campaign is also going on on social media regarding this incident. The hashtag 'Ankita Hum Sharminda Hain' is trending on Twitter.

The Jharkhand government has constituted SIT for fast and speedy action. People are also angry that when Ankita was battling between life and death in the hospital, no government representative took care of her and her family members. A video of Ankita's statement before her death is going viral, in which she is saying that Shahrukh, who burnt her, has gone to jail, but still his people are threatening to kill her family members.

--IANS
miz/dpb

New Delhi, Aug 30 (IANS) An expatriate group has approached the Delhi High Court seeking regulation of the exorbitant ticket prices of flights operating between the Gulf countries and India.

The writ petition of Kerala Pravasi Association (KPA), a registered Society, filed through Adv Kuriakose Varghese, a managing partner at KMNP Law pointed out that there are no yardsticks to fix the reasonableness of profit, thereby making the tariff fixation of tickets is highly irrational and non-transparent.

The tariffs are often dictated by the airline which has the larger seat share, thereby resulting in abuse of dominant position, the plea said.

Indians constitute the major population of the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries. Living in harsh and difficult conditions all-round the year, the expats look forward to visiting their homes and re-uniting with their families during summer vacations and other festive times, after saving money for months or years.

Unfortunately, in the recent past, this has become virtually impossible, especially for expats from Kerala due to the exorbitant and prohibitive fares charged by airlines, which operate in the sectors connecting the Gulf countries and India, the plea stated.

As per the data published by the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India for the year 2020, approximately 89 lakh Indian Citizens are living in major countries of Gulf region, including UnitedAArab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman.

The petition said that unreasonable and exorbitant airfares impose restrictions on air travel as a mode of transportation and, thereby, infringe the constitutionally protected rights of Indian passengers to or from Gulf countries.

"While the airfares are normally market-driven and are not established or regulated by the Government, the ambiguity in the Rules confer unbridled powers on the airlines to establish fares which are exploitative. In this regard, it is submitted that the impugned Rule is also beyond the scope of the parent Act which prescribe that the Central Government may make Rules for economic regulation of civil aviation and air transport services, including the approval, disapproval, or revision on tariff of operators of air transport services," it read.

The petition sought directions to the Centre and others to recognise and follow the International Air service Agreements entered pursuant to the Convention of International Civil Aviation, 1944 to prohibit excessive and predatory tariffs for international flights.

Although Rule 135(4) of the Aircraft Rules, 1937 (Rules') empowers DGCA to issue directions to an airline if it is satisfied that such airline has established excessive or predatory tariff under Rule 135(1) or has indulged in oligopolistic practice, the said provision is rendered otiose on account of the arbitrary and unbridled powers given under Rule 135(1) of the Rules to the airlines to establish tariff, the petition said further.

The plea also sought to declare the phrase "reasonable profit" and "generally prevailing tariff" of Rule 135(1) of the Aircraft Rules, 1937 is vague, arbitrary and unconstitutional.

The Ministry of Civil Aviation, Ministry of External Affairs, Ministry of Law and Justice, Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) are the other respondents.

--IANS
jw/shb/