Political

Defence

Pakistan: 55 killed, scores wounded in two blasts on the Prophet’s birth anniversary

September 29, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: At least 55 people were killed and over 50 wounded, many of them critically, in two powerful blasts that ripped through mosques in Pakistan within hours on Friday, the Prophet’s birth anniversary known as Eid-e-Milad-un-Nabi. According to media reports, a suicide blast occurred near a mosque in Pakistan’s restive Balochistan […]

Business

Roving Periscope: After terror and donkeys, Pakistan now ‘exports’ beggars!

September 29, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: In an acute embarrassment to Pakistan, its co-religionist nations like Saudi Arabia, and Iraq have asked the nearly bankrupt South Asian country to stop ‘exporting’ beggars! Not surprising though because, according to reports, a tenth of the Pakistani population—25 million in a country of nearly 250 million–resorts to begging either […]

Business

Joe the First: US President Biden himself joins agitating workers against automakers!

September 28, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: Trust politicians to do anything they can to woo voters. But it can happen only in America. In an unprecedented move, Joe Biden joined agitating auto workers on the picket line in Michigan on Tuesday in a historic first for a sitting US president, a day before rival Donald Trump […]

Business

Obituary: India’s God of Farming, MSS, is yet to be honored with Bharat Ratna

September 28, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: “If God appears to poor and hungry in the form of bread, as Mahatma Gandhi said, that God is Dr. MS Swaminathan who should be worshipped by every citizen while taking daily meals,” Dr. AK Singh, Director, Indian Agriculture Research Institute (IARI) said as he paid glowing tributes to the […]

Business

Roving Periscope: Canada’s speaker resigns; now, focus back on Trudeau’s fate

September 27, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: As Canadian House of Commons Speaker Anthony Rota resigned amid a row over praising a Nazi veteran, pressure built up on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to follow suit after Russia, Israel, Poland, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh joined India with different controversial issues riling the North American country for over a […]

Business

Vibrant Gujarat@20: India to be a global economic powerhouse soon, says PM Modi

September 27, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit Ahmedabad: Celebrating the 20 years of the Vibrant Gujarat Global Summits he launched as Chief Minister in 2003 to rebrand the western state as an investment destination, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday said India will soon emerge as a global economic powerhouse. Since 2003, the Gujarat Government organized nine biennial editions […]

Business

Roving Periscope: Differences mushroom between China, Pak on CPEC projects

September 26, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: Even Pakistan’s “all-weather friend” China has dumped its South Asian vassal state. Beijing, itself facing an economic crisis, has refused to further expand cooperation with a nearly bankrupt Islamabad on various sectors under the now fledgling China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). According to the media reports on Tuesday, China has refused […]

Business

UPI: Persons-to-merchants transactions to be 75% of all by 2025, says Worldline

September 26, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: India’s extremely popular Unified Payments Interface (UPI), which revolutionized digital payments in the last five years, is set to scale new heights in the next five years: three-fourths of all online transactions will be from person-to-merchant (P2M) by 2025. In other words, the ubiquitous Quick Response (QR) Code has largely […]

Business

Gaming: Centre serves tax notices for Rs. 55,000 crores on Dream11, other firms

September 26, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: Exploiting fanatics of various games and sports, several online gambling companies, claiming to be ‘gaming’ platforms, have cropped up worldwide over the years. In India, they have found valuable ‘customers’ among cricket addicts and enthusiasts and their business runs into billions of rupees across rural and urban areas alike. This […]

Business

Roving Periscope: After Khalistanis, Ukrainian Nazi’s welcome haunts Canada

September 25, 2023 Vinayak Barot

Virendra Pandit New Delhi: Amid the Canada-India row on the Khalistani issue, the North American nation’s Lower House of Parliament has apologized for ‘honoring’ a Ukrainian veteran Nazi last week, the media reported on Monday. Canadian House of Commons Speaker Anthony Rota apologized to the Jewish community after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was criticized […]