View Articles

West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, the Trinamool Congress supremo, is now finding herself entrapped in a political state — with credits fully going to her for creating this trap, which has now become a headache for her. Last year, on Trinamool's annual mega rally, held every year in 21st July, Mamata being confident about the defeat of Narendra Modi-led BJP declared that her party would play a major role after the results of 2019 elections — indirectly indicating there were chances that she herself would occupy the post prime minister.

The letter written by 49 celebrities, mostly representing the film industry, to the prime minister about mob lynching, appears to have created a greater stir among the BJP’s supporters than similar missives penned earlier by groups of retired bureaucrats.

A septuagenarian retired private sector employee, getting a minimum EPFO pension of Rs. 1,000 per month, has saved money for over 50 years since he took up his first job, mostly in government schemes — such as postal small savings certificates, fixed deposits with public sector banks, subscription to government bonds, railway bonds, housing finance companies of PSU banks and LIC pension, for safety of his life-long tax-paid savings — is asked by the income-tax department to submit a ‘balance sheet’ of his deposits and income along with the annual tax return. This is despite the fact that all his income from savings earns the government the statutory 10 percent tax at source (TDS). They are linked with his PAN number. But, the income-tax department, tom-toming ‘saral’ or simple format of tax return system, is not impressed.

It’s Bayamo’s turn this year on July 26. The capital city of Granma Province in eastern Cuba hosted Cuba’s Day of National Rebellion. President Miguel Díaz-Canel and other Cuban leaders presided over a day which celebrates young revolutionaries who, 66 years earlier on another July 26, attacked military barracks in Santiago de Cuba and in Bayamo.

Reserve Bank of India has further eased the norms for external commercial borrowings for the corporate sector. Among many other activities, the RBI now allows such ECBs for repaying rupee loans, including outstanding non-performing or sticky loans. These sticky loans could also be sold to willing overseas buyers of such portfolios.

BERLIN: Tug-of-war is an innocent sport but in world politics, it’s a dangerous game, especially if played like some of the Vikings did – across a fiery pit awaiting the losers.

Floods in Bihar do not only bring thousands of cusecs of rain water from the catchment areas of Nepal.. Instead it brings billions of institutional finance and government fund for the vested interests and particularly for the contractors and bureaucrats. The officers prefer postings in the flood prone areas of the north Bihar.

The passage of National Medical Commission (NMC) bill in the Lok Sabha on July 29, 2019 will always be a black day in the India’s healthcare history. No doubt the Medical Council of India (MCI) had lost its credibility, more so after the exposure of corrupt practices by it’s the then president Dr Ketan Desai. There were several reports of connivance of some higher-ups in the medical council with the private medical colleges.

BHOPAL: There is no end to the cold war between the Congress and the BJP. Kailash Vijayvargiya, general secretary of BJP and a powerful leader of Madhya Pradesh said that his party would soon initiate mission Madhya Pradesh but the mission will be launched only after the party wins the confidence vote in Karnataka Vidhan Sabha and normalcy is restored there. After Karnataka his party will launch another mission targeting Congress government in Madhya Pradesh. Talking to newsmen in Jaipur he said “It is not our wish to make a government fall. But the Congress MLAs have uncertainty in themselves.

Finally, B.S. Yediyurappa of the BJP became the chief minister of Karnataka for the fourth time. Since the formation of the Congress-JD(S) coalition government led by H.D. Kumaraswamy of JD(S) last year after the assembly polls failed to give a clear verdict to any party, Yediyurappa has been anxiously waiting to occupy the post of the chief minister. And, eventually, Yediyurappa, party's tallest leader coming from the powerful Lingayat community, succeeded and saffronised Karnataka — the only south Indian state in BJP’s kitty.