Blog - The Purbottar

24 Jun

Bengal Extends Lockdown Till July 31

editor0 CommentsNorth East

Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has extended the current lockdown with relaxations in the state from June 30 to July 31. Announcing this at the end of a 3-hour all party meeting today, Ms Banerjee said, "The COVID-19 problem is spreading. Let is try and extend the lockdown with restrictions till July 31." Bengal recorded 370 new cases of coronavirus yesterday, which took the total to 14,728. Of these, the number of active cases is 4,930. Besides, 11 deaths were recorded which brought the total to 580. Another key decision on the coronavirus crisis taken during today's meeting is to…

24 Jun

Complaint filed in Bihar court seeks FIR against Baba Ramdev over COVID-19 medicine claim.

editor0 CommentsNorth East

After the government asked Ramdev's Patanjali Ayurved to stop advertising about Ayurvedic medicines that allegedly cure Covid-19, until the Ayush Ministry examines the medicines, a complaint has been filed against the Company owners before a court in Muzaffarpur, Bihar.The complaint has been filed by social activist Tamanna Hashmi under Sections 420 (Cheating), 120B (Criminal Conspiracy), 270 (Malignant act likely to spread infection of disease dangerous to life) and 504 (Intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) of IPC. Hashmi has named Patanjali Research Institute convenor Ramdev and his aide Balkrishna, the chairman of the organisation, as accused.…

24 Jun

Facebook to buy 9.99% stake in Jio Platform for ₹43,574 crore.

editor0 CommentsBusiness

The antitrust watchdog is reviewing Facebook’s purchase of a 10 per cent stake in Reliance Industries’ (RIL) digital assets, a deal that would give the US giant another foothold in one of the world’s fastest growing internet markets. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) looks to prevent misuse of data in all the deals it assesses, Chairman Ashok Kumar Gupta said in an email interview, declining to comment further on the Facebook-Jio transaction pending examination. The regulator is also considering whether new parameters should be included in its assessment criteria. “Currently, some mergers and acquisitions escape the threshold for scrutiny…

24 Jun

BS6 Honda Grazia 125 launched.

editor0 CommentsBusiness

Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India on Wednesday launched the BS6 compliant version two-wheeler Grazia 124. The all-new Grazia 125 dispatches will commence starting this week. Grazia 125 BS6 will be available at a starting price of Rs. 73,336 (for Standard version, ex-showroom).There will be two variants - Standard & Deluxe in four bold colours – Mat Cyber Yellow, Pearl Spartan Red, Pearl Siren Blue and Mat Axis Grey.At the heart of Grazia 125 ticks BS6 compliant Honda's trusted 125cc PGM-FI HET (Honda Eco Technology) engine, boosted by Enhanced Smart Power (eSP). It also comes equipped with a unique multi-function switch…

24 Jun

Assam student who was upset because he did not have a smart phone to attend online classes, was found dead.

editor0 CommentsAssam, North East

GUWAHATI: A 16-year-old student, who was upset because he did not have a smart phone to attend online classes, was found dead near his house in Assam’s Chirang district on June 23.According to reports, the student of Class 10, who came from a very poor family, was troubled as he could not take part in online classes and examinations conducted by his school as he did not have a smart phone. From what we have been able to gather after talking to neighbours and others close to the student, it appears he was fed up with the situation and decided…

24 Jun

RBI told that the Google Pay is a 3rd party app provider and does not operate any payment systems.

editor0 CommentsBusiness

GUWAHATI: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has told the Delhi High Court that Google Pay is a third party app provider (TPAP) and does not operate any payment systems.Further, RBI stated that its operations are not in violation of the Payment and Settlement System Act of 2007, RBI. Responding to a PIL filed by financial economist Abhijit Mishra who has alleged that Google's mobile payment app was facilitating financial transactions without the requisite authorisation, RBI added that since Google Pay does not operate any payment system, it does not find a place in the list of authorised payment system…

24 Jun

India coronavirus: US curbs ‘unfair’ Air India repatriation flights

editor0 CommentsNorth EastAIRINDIA

The US has accused India's national carrier of "discriminatory practices" and curbed repatriation flights it was operating both to and from the country. The US Department of Transportation (DOT) said Air India was also selling tickets for the flights which meant they were not "true repatriations". It added that US carriers were not being allowed to conduct similar operations to and from India, despite submissions from airline companies. Air India has not responded as yet. A statement on the DOT website said that the carrier would now have to apply for statements of authorisation prior to conducting charter flights and that…

24 Jun

Why Trump’s H-1B visa freeze will hurt India most

editor0 CommentsNorth EastUSA, VISA

Illegal immigration has long been the subject of fervid debate in the US. Now President Donald Trump is making "legal immigration a scapegoat" with an eye on the upcoming election, says Poorvi Chotani, a managing partner at Law Quest, an immigration law firm with offices in the US and India. "How can the US recover more than 17 million lost jobs due to the pandemic by keeping out a little more than half a million foreign workers for the rest of the year?" she told me. Ms Chotani is mainly alluding to the H-1B visa programme that currently admits 85,000 immigrants each…

23 Jun

How Apple plans to take on WhatsApp with iOS 14.

editor0 CommentsBusiness

Back in 2018, during a regular quarterly earnings call with investors, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg made a rather startling admission. "Our biggest competitor by far is iMessage ," Zuckerberg told investors about Apple's default messaging app as a huge threat. Till yesterday, one might have felt that Apple — while making subtle changes — hadn't really upped the ante on Facebook and its family of apps like Messenger and WhatsApp . However, at WWDC 2020 , Apple with iOS 14 announced how Messages is set to change significantly with new features that are designed to take on other instant messaging…

23 Jun

Delhi HC grants bail to pregnant Jamia student Safoora Zargar.

editor0 CommentsNorth East

The Delhi high court Tuesday granted bail to Jamia student Safoora Zargar, who is pregnant and was arrested under anti-terror law UAPA in a case related to communal violence in northeast Delhi during protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act, as Solicitor General Tushar Mehta did not oppose it on humanitarian grounds. Justice Rajiv Shakdher passed the order after the Central government, represented by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, agreed to Ms. Zargar's bail plea on humanitarian grounds. The Solicitor General said that the order enlarging her on bail should not be made a precedent and additonally insisted on a series of…