by admin | May 25, 2021 | Markets, Technology
New Delhi, (IANS) Lenovo India on Tuesday launched Lenovo ZUK Z1 smartphone that runs on Cyanogen operating system (OS) 12.1 — an OS that enables deep customisation of the user interface with its theme app.
The device comes in white and grey colours and will be available for Rs.13,499 on Amazon.in via flash sales.
“The biggest demand of a customer is to get maximum experience in an affordable smartphone and the Lenovo ZUK Z1 is our attempt to offer a complete package of powerpack performance and user friendly experience in one device at a customer friendly price point,” said Sudhin Mathur, director-smartphones, Lenovo India, in a statement.
The phone is backed by a 4,100mAh battery with cut off feature that switches to the power source instead of using the phone’s battery once the battery is fully charged.
The Lenovo ZUK Z1 has 64GB eMMC 5.0 inbuilt storage and is backed by a 2.5 GHz Snapdragon 801 processor along with 3GB RAM.
It comes with USB 3.0 Type C with reversible plugin design that supports a transfer speed of up to 5GBps. The device comes with an inbuilt 360 degree fingerprint reader button.
Equipped with Lenovo’s PerfectView 5.5-inch display, the Lenovo ZUK Z1 comes with a 13MP camera with optical image stabilisation and dual LED flash. It has an 8MP selfie camera.
Cyanogen 12.1 is a fluid operating system with a number of advanced features optimised for performance, power consumption, security and privacy.
Registrations for the first sale start on May 10 at 1 p.m. The first sale is scheduled for May 19 at 2 p.m.
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Opinions
London,(IANS) A spurt in number of billionaires and increasing wealth creation by any means have made India rank ninth among the crony capitalist countries, said a study in “The Economist” latest issue.
According to the weekly crony-capitalism index, crony fortunes had leapt relative to global GDP and as a share of total billionaire wealth.
“Encouragingly, India seems to be cleaning up its act. In 2008 crony wealth reached 18 percent of its GDP, putting it on a par with Russia. Today it stands at 3 percent of its GDP, a level similar to Australia,” the study revealed.
The non-crony sector wealth in India accounts for 8.3 percent of its GDP.
The index ranked Russia as the worst crony-capitalist country, followed by Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Ukraine, Mexico, Indonesia and Turkey above India. Taiwan and China are ranked 10th and 11th after India.
The magazine’s index of crony capitalists is based on a study by Ruchir Sharma of Morgan Stanley Investment Management and Aditi Gandhi and Michael Walton of Delhi’s Centre for Policy Research.
The index was designed in 2014 to test whether the world was experiencing a new era of arobber barons’ – a global re-run of Americas’s “gilded age” in the late 19th century.
“It may seem that this new golden era of crony capitalism is coming to a shabby end. In London, Vijay Mallya, a ponytailed Indian tycoon, is fighting deportation back to India as the authorities there rake over his collapsed empire,” the article said, in light of legal battles the liquor baron is facing back home.
Using data on billionaires’ fortunes from rankings by the US magazine Forbes, the article labelled each billionaire as a crony or not, based on the industry in which he is most active.
“The pin-ups of Indian capitalism are no longer the pampered scions of its business dynasties, but the hungry founders of Flipkart, an e-commerce firm,” the study said, referring to its co-founders Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal figuring in the Forbes’ 2016 billionaires list, ranked jointly at 1,476 position.
Among the 22 countries in the updated index, Germany is the cleanest with least number of crony capitalists, ranking at the bottom of the index, while China has the biggest concentration of crony wealth in the world at $360 billion.
The study suggested that since globalisation had taken off in the 1990s, there had been a surge in billionaire wealth in industries that often involve cosy relations with the government, such as casinos, oil and construction.
Over two decades, crony fortunes had leapt relative to global GDP and as a share of total billionaire wealth.
“The economic climate has been tough on cronies, too. Commodity prices have tanked, cutting the value of mines, steel mills and oilfield concessions. Emerging-market currencies and shares have fallen. Asia’s long property boom has sputtered,” the study added.
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Corporate, Corporate Governance, Economy, News
New Delhi:(IANS) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday ordered a multi-agency probe team on the global expose by International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), dubbed the “Panama Papers”, which found over 500 Indians also had alleged offshore links.
“A multi-agency group is being formed to monitor the black money trail,” Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said here after the expose was published in The Indian Express. “Details of the assets worth Rs.6,500 crore has already been found,” he added.
As per a statement issued by his ministry, the probe team will comprise officers from the Central Board of Direct Taxes’ Financial Intelligence Unit, its Tax Research Unit as also officials from the Reserve Bank of India.
“The group will monitor the flow of information in each one of the case. The government will take all the necessary actions as required to get maximum information from all sources including from foreign governments to help in the investigation process,” the statement added.
The journalists’ consortium had said late on Sunday that its members and more than 100 other news organisations around the globe have found offshore links of some of the planet’s most prominent people. The list included over 500 Indians.
The details of the Indians with such offshore funds were published in The Indian Express. But whether or not such funds exist, and also if they were illegal is what the probe team ordered by Modi is expected to look into.
“In terms of size, the Panama Papers is likely the biggest leak of inside information in history – more than 11.5 million documents – and it is equally likely to be one of the most explosive in the nature of its revelations,” the consortium said of its investigation published.
In the context of the commitment of the central government to bring out undisclosed money both from abroad and from within the country, information brought out by any investigative journalism was welcome, the finance ministry said.
The ministry said in the past too, based on the investigations by ICIJ in 2013 — that showed the links of 700 Indians with business connection with off-shore entities — the agencies of the government were able to identify 434 persons as Indian residents.
It also said 184 persons admitted their relationship with such off-shore entities/transactions.
“Although, in the previous report of ICIJ, information relating to financial transactions/bank accounts was not available, the government authorities have detected credit in the undisclosed foreign accounts of such Indian persons in excess of Rs.2,000 crores.”
As a consequence, 52 prosecution complaints have been filed against the alleged offenders so far.
“The government is committed to detecting and preventing the generation of black money. In this context the expose of Panama Papers will further help the government in meeting the objective,” the finance ministry added.
The government expressed concern that tax havens were making countries like India suffer tax losses.
“The recent initiative of ‘Base Erosion’ and ‘Profit Shifting’ (BEPS) will help India and other countries in checking the practice of tax-avoidance through such tax havens. India is also fully committed to the BEPS initiative.”
In India, The Indian Express ran several pages of the investigation reports alleging, among other names, Bollywood superstarts Amitabh Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai, being directors in companies in Panama.
The two did not immediately respond despite efforts to contact them. Aishwarya Rai’s media adviser told the newspaper that the information was false. The spokesperson for Aishwarya Rai said “no” when IANS asked her if she intended to issue a statement.
Among those named in the report were Sameer Gehlaut of India Bulls and K.P. Singh of DLF. Vinod Adani, elder brother of industrialist Gautam Adani, politician Shishir Bajoria from West Bengal and Anurag Kejriwal of Loksatta Party were also alleged to have set up companies in tax havens.
Bajoria told the paper that that “erroneous beneficial owner information” was given by mistake.
The Express said it had carried out the investigations spread over eight months with several global newspapers. Many of the other persons named in the Express reports responded, some denying while others maintaining that they had worked within the laws of the country.
Among the global leaders named were 12 current and former world leaders, including Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s family members. It also sought to reveal how associates of Russian President Vladimir Putin secretly shuffled as much as $2 billion through banks and shadow firms.
In Russia, the state-run media organisations were silent on the subject. In Pakistan, however, Sharif’s son Hussain told Geo News that his family had not done anything wrong.
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business, Large Enterprise
Washington : (IANS) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday sought New Zealand’s cooperation in the dairy industry during a bilateral meeting with his New Zealand counterpart John Key here.
“The prime minister talked about our interest in having dairy technology from New Zealand,” external affairs ministry spokesman Vikas Swarup said at a media briefing here.
Modi’s meeting with Key was held on the sidelines of the fourth and final edition of the biennial Nuclear Security Summit, the first of which was held in 2010.
“As you know, New Zealand is one of the world leaders in food processing. Prime minister said that India is one of the world’s largest producers of milk,” Swarup said.
Modi said that when it came to processing milk, India was not too good and New Zealand could find a very good market in India since the food processing industry has been enabled to obtain 100 percent foreign direct investment (FDI).
Discussions between the Indian and New Zealand prime ministers also involved trade issues.
“The New Zealand prime minister said that they had concluded a very successful FTA (free trade agreement) with China some years back and he was very keen on signing an FTA with India as well,” Swarup said.
The two prime ministers also discussed the promotion of tourism between the two countries given Bollywood’s interest in New Zealand.
Modi also told Key that more and more Indian students should be encouraged to study in New Zealand as they felt safe there.
The Indian prime minister said that New Zealand could follow Australia’s example of attracting Indian students.
Modi arrived here on the second leg of his three-nation tour on Wednesday night from Brussels where he attended the 13th India-European Union (EU) Summit and held a bilateral meeting with Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel.
Leaders of 53 nations and four international organisations are attending the Nuclear Security Summit.
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Muslim World
New Delhi : (IANS) Prime Minister Narendra Modi will arrive in Riyadh from Washington on Saturday on the third and last leg of his three-nation tour to pay a two-day bilateral visit to Saudi Arabia at the invitation of King Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.
This will be the first prime ministerial visit from India to the Gulf kingdom after the visit of then prime minister Manmohan Singh in 2010.
During that visit, the relationship between the two countries was elevated to “strategic partnership”.
This was after the Delhi Declaration made during then King Abdullah’s historic visit to India in 2006, the first by a Saudi monarch in five decades.
There are four key aspects to India’s relationship with Saudi Arabia: energy cooperation, the nearly three million-strong expatriate Indian community, Haj pilgrimage and security cooperation.
Saudi Arabia is India’s largest crude oil supplier accounting for one-fifth of the total imports. In 2015, India imported $21 billion worth of crude oil from that Gulf nation.
Saudi Arabia is also India’s fourth largest trading partner with exports to that country exceeding $11 billion.
At over 2.96 million, Indians form the largest expatriate community in Saudi Arabia and are crucial to the Indian economy as they send over $10 billion in remittances every year.
Over 134,000 Indians go for the Haj pilgrimage every year and almost 300,000 for Umra.
A key aspect of the strategic partnership between the two countries is the defence cooperation agreement signed during then Crown Prince Salman’s visit to India in 2014.
With Saudi Arabia upping the ante against terrorism, security cooperation also has become an important cornerstone of the relationship. In recent times, Riyadh handed over to New Delhi key terror operatives like Abu Jundal and Abdul Aziz alias Gidda.
“India’s ties with Saudi Arabia are special,” Prime Minister Modi said in a statement ahead of his departure from New Delhi.
“Robust people-to-people ties constitute a key component of our engagement. I plan to work with the Saudi leadership to expand and deepen our bilateral relations. Discussions on the regional situation would also be on the agenda,” he said.
The prime minister also said that he wanted Saudi businesses to partner in India’s development plans.
Soon after his arrival in Riyadh on Saturday afternoon, Modi will visit the historic Masmak fortress.
The fortress was taken over by King Abdulaziz in 1902 in a sudden attack which marked the start of the history of the third state of Saudi Arabia.
Thereafter, Modi will meet with members of the Indian community which will be followed by a visit to the L&T workers’ residential complex.
L&T is doing $2 billion worth of work on the $600-billion Riyadh Metro Project.
On Sunday, the prime minister will visit the Tata Consultancy Services’ (TCS) all-women IT centre.
“It is a very happy thing that he will be doing because this centre provides employment opportunities to Saudi women and this is empowerment of Saudi women,” Mridul Kumar, joint secretary (Gulf) in the external affairs ministry, said at a media briefing in connection with the visit.
“When the centre started two or three years back, there were 80 people in that centre. It has now grown to over 1,000,” he said, adding that 80 percent of the workers there were local Saudi girls.
Stating that this was the first BPO operation by any company in the world in Saudi Arabia, Kumar said that “it is a very important statement that we will be making there”.
After this, Modi will meet with select top Saudi business leaders.
The official ceremony at the Royal Court will start in the afternoon when King Salman will receive the prime minister
King Salman will host a lunch in Modi’s honour in which key Saudi ministers and other leaders will be present,
This will be followed by a delegation-level meeting and signing of agreements.
The prime minister will leave for New Delhi late Sunday afternoon.
