National Service Scheme (NSS) to Focus on Skill Development to be Transformed into National Service and Skill Development Scheme (NSSD)

The Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports has decided to reposition the National Service Scheme (NSS) by adding a new Skill Development dimension to the scheme. The new focus of the scheme would be on students attaining employable skills while undertaking work with the community to bring about sustainable social change and equity. A pilot project to this effect would be undertaking in the current financial year.

Renewable Energy an Important Source - Opinion

Electricity is one of the prime requirements for any country to develop. Without it, infrastructural bottlenecks accentuate, causing hurdles in growth across the board. Industries, Agriculture, services and in fact every walk of life need electricity to move forward. With this in view, India has been making all efforts to generate as much electricity as possible from different sources. These include Hydro, thermal, nuclear and even non- conventional sources like solar and wind energy.

Big ideas for micro units

Micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) play a pivotal role in India’s industrial development, as they help hone and nurture the talent and skills of entrepreneurs. The MSME sector contributes 8 per cent to the country’s GDP, 45 per cent to the manufactured output, and 40 per cent to exports, and provides employment to 60 million people through 28.5 million enterprises.

How to live sustainably every day (Part 3) - A thriftier kitchen

A recent news article reported that American families waste nearly 40 per cent of the food they buy. As Indian householders get busier and more frazzled, we too are losing a good bit of our vegetables and provisions to carelessness. One rotten tomato can spoil an entire kilo. Packaged beans from a department store may contain those which are too stringy to use. A cut piece of white melon may rot in the fridge. Meanwhile, vegetable prices are rising every day.

How to live sustainably every day (Part 2) - It’s all about easy composting

In rural households, vegetable peels, plant clippings, coconut husks and other organic waste are all tossed under a tree or into a trench and eventually find their way back into the nutrient cycle of the garden. In the city, we are more fussy about what parts of a vegetable we use; we throw out vegetables that have wilted and rotted because we forgot about them. We have no cows and chicken to eat the food we won’t eat, so we accumulate much more vegetable waste.

How to live sustainably every day (Part 1) - How to trash that

Sooner or later, as we drive out of our leafy neighbourhoods and happening cities, we see them. Piles of garbage, stinking, oozing, and spilling on to the freshly tarred road. Somebody in the car says, ‘Why can’t they incinerate? Why can’t they recycle? Why can’t they do something?’ But this particular issue has to be addressed with ‘Why can’t we do something?’Those stinking, oozing piles come from households very much like ours. We generate endless streams of plastic wrapping and thermocol from white goods, paper and cardboard from branded purchases, and heaps of food waste.

Small is lucrative - Google is all set to train professionals who will help SMEs in India manage their digital campaigns

There is a strong demand for digital advertising from small and medium sized businesses (SMEs) in the country, To cater to them Google India has launched a ‘SME Partner Programme’.Through this, the company will train premier SME partners to offer the highest level of expertise and proficiency in developing, launching and managing digital campaigns for SME ventures. The partners will offer end-to-end marketing solutions like search engine marketing, localised marketing solutions across Google properties and a mobile advertising platform.

RFID-enabled services for supply chain management

RFID-enabled services are increasingly used in supply chain management by fixing RFID tags on the pallets or products and using special readers to track the products. Modern tags, which can be reused any number of times, are also available now.If a retailer who sources his products from several locations and has operations in different cities wants to have real-time data of the goods in his warehouses and at the outlets, he can go in for the Radio Frequency Identification-enabled services.Dubai-based Hexomatrixx has taken the technology forward by integrating the RFID reader to smart phones. It has already tested this in some of the overseas markets and plans to launch it in India too.

Election Commission of India to work together With Civil Society

The Election Commission of India and Civil Society Organisations have decided to work together on inclusive and greater participation of people in the electoral process. This was decided during a two-day consultation ECI held with a range of Civil Society Organizations in New Delhi concluded yesterday. The consultation also came up with recommandations on the challenges faced by Election Commission in meeting gender gap, fighting urban apathy, overcoming youth disconnect, inclusion of marginalised and weaker section and promoting ethical and informed voting. The Consultation also identified areas in which CSOs can extend electoral services support to election machinery at the grassroots level.

Smartphone race split three ways

The next-generation smartphone market is a three-way race between Apple’s iPhone 5, Microsoft’s Windows 8 phones and Google’s Android 4.0x-based devices.With the launch of iPhone 5, the die has been cast for an intense competition among smartphones.With Apple’s iPhone 5 trying to re-establish its supremacy over the Android devices such as Samsung Galaxy S3 and HTC One X, it does look like Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 8 mobile phones will be the dark horse.

‘Opt for chai-pakora wedding’ - Krishna Tirath

Asking people to opt for a chai-pakora wedding and not force the girl’s family to over-stretch themselves by spending lavishly, the Union Women and Child Development Ministry is now in talks with other Ministries concerned to bring in laws/regulations to cap the spending on weddings.

Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana

The Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana (PMSSY) aims at correcting the imbalances in the availability of affordable healthcare facilities in the different parts of the country in general, and augmenting facilities for quality medical education in the under-served States in particular. The scheme was approved in March 2006.The first phase in the PMSSY has two components - setting up of six institutions in the line of AIIMS; and upgradation of 13 existing Government medical college institutions.

Project Arrow

Project Arrow is an initiative to transform India Post into a vibrant and responsive organization and to make a visible and positive difference in postal operations to benefit the customers.It has been launched with objective of modernizing the post and makes visible, tangible and noteworthy differences in the post office operations that matter to “Aam Aadmi”.

Kerala Cluster of Coastal Radar Network

The Marine security network will get a boost with the setting up of a Remote Operating Station (ROS) at Kochi as part of the Coastal Radar Network. This is being developed by Defence Public Sector Undertaking, Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) for the Indian Coast Guard.A Regional Operating Centre (ROC) at Mumbai and Remote Operating Station (ROS) at Porbandar as part of the Coastal Radar Network has also been set up.

Diesel Price Increased by Rs 5 per litre; Subsidised Domestic LPG Cylinders restricted to 6 in a year

The Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs (CCPA) met on 13thSeptember, 2012 under the chairmanship of the Prime Minister to consider the disturbingsituation arising out of projected massive under-recoveries of Rs. 1,87,127 crore for the financial year 2012-13 in the wake of high international crude oil prices and sharp depreciation of Indian Rupee against US Dollar. The uncompensated under-recovery causes loss tothe Public Sector Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs). The CCPA took the following decisions to be implemented with effect from the midnight of 13/14 September 2012 :

Grow, Transform and Sustain – The Mantra for Indian PSUs

India’s central public sector enterprises have undergone a cycle of transformation since the introduction of liberal economic policies a couple of decades ago.Many believed that the public sector enterprises will simply wither away because of competition and their inefficiency; or they will be subsumed by the private sector because of the divestment programme.However, as the experience has shown, the Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs) continue to have a critical role to play in many businesses, especially in the strategic sectors.Many CPSEs have proved their critics wrong by becoming extremely efficient and competitive.

Comparison between old and new visa agreements between India and Pakistan

 Below is the comparison between old and new visa agreements between India and Pakistan

The food crisis and India

The World Bank has joined the chorus warning the world of an impending food crisis with damaging food price inflation. In its late-August edition of its Food Price Watch the Bank reported that global prices for food as reflected by its Food Price Index rose 10 per cent in July 2012 alone. The prices of staples such as corn and soya bean were at an all-time high that month, with the increase in corn prices amounting to 25 per cent and that in soya bean to 17 per cent over a single month. Earlier, the FAO had reported that its Food Price Index (FPI) rose by 6 per cent in July 2012, driven by grain and sugar prices. Cereal prices had risen by 17 per cent in June relative to the previous month, maize prices by close to 23 per cent and wheat prices by around 19 per cent.

Visionary extraordinaire - Verghese Kurien

Much has already been said and written about the monumental contributions of Verghese Kurien to the development of the Indian dairy industry, rooted on the Gandhian Principle of production by masses. I met Dr. Kurien soon after his return from Michigan State University and his taking up residence at Anand. From then on, we shared ideas and experiences in the area of rural transformation through agriculture and dairying. Among the very many unique contributions of Dr. Kurien which led to India becoming the leading milk producer of the world, I would like to highlight a few.

Breastfeeding – The Best Start in Infant’s Life - Opinion

Breastmilk is natural and perfect food for the baby.WHO recommends that all infants should be fed exclusively on breastmilk until they are six months of age and continued to be breastfed till two years or beyond along with the introduction of adequate complementary foods after six months of age.Breastmilk provides uniquely appropriate concentrations of almost all the nutrients for infants at the time when the growth and development rates are maximal.Mother’s milk comprises of White Blood Cells (leucocytes), macrophages and epithelial cells; lipids (triacylgycerols, free fatty acids, phospholipids, sterols, hydrocarbons and fat soluble vitamins); carbohydrates (lactose, galactose, glucose, oligosaccharides, and glycoproteins); protein (casein, α-lactalbumin, lactoferrin, immunoglobins like SlgA and others, lysozymes, enzymes, harmones and growth factors); non-protein nitrogenous compounds (urea, creatine, creatinine, uric acid, amino acids including glutamine, nucleic acid, nucleotides and polyamines), water soluble vitamins, macronutrient elements, trace elements and various non nutritional components (anti-microbial factors, digestive enzymes and growth modulators) that promote the infant’s growth and development.

AEPC’s Outlook, Role and Vision - Opinion

Born in 1978- Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) is a sponsored body under the Ministry of Textiles. Build and lived to its mandate of Apparel and Garments export promotions in India; it tells the saga of the bygone era.  From just being a quota monitoring entity, AEPC is today a powerful body for the promotion and facilitation of garment manufacturing and their exports. AEPC is endowed with the power to create myth, transcending moments of apparel export history as a narrative of extraordinary time. This body has recorded amazing kaleidoscopic breadth of events– witness of good and bad business environment. AEPC has often triumphant in the cause of promoting apparel export with the cooperation and stupendous talent of exports across India. Initially started with a just one office, with a passage of time it has grown to be the largest Export Promotion Council having membership of nearly 8000 from amongst large Corporate Houses, Star Trading Houses, Small & Medium Scale Units (SME), Trading Houses, etc. Out of the total membership of the Council, 85% constitutes the SMEs.

Kerala governement ‘Likes’ Netizen Police on FB

It seems the State government ‘Likes’ Netizen Police, a group on the Facebook.The group in the social networking site has become a movement strong enough to make the State Government take notice of it. The group has many stories of online frauds and cyber crimes that the State Government is now actively following them up.“Reports on the basis of complaints lodged at the group are being prepared, which will be forwarded to the cyber cell. Cases will be registered against those found committing online crimes,” Minister for Home Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan told The Hindu.

India-EU BTIA Negotiations: What is India Asking For? - Opinion

 

At a time when the bilateral trade in goods between India and the European Union was € 40 billion, when India exported € 3.8 billion worth of services to EU, and when EU was India’s largest source of foreign direct investment; or in short when there were healthy trends in bilateral trade and investment between the two, the seeds of a High Level Trade Group (HLTG) were sown during the 2005 India-EU Summit to explore ways to give further boost to trade and investment between the duo. Different platforms were thought over during the brainstorming discussions by the HLTG. It was commonly agreed upon during the discussions that only after the removal of non-tariff obstacles to trade could the dream of strong trade ties be built. It was finally recommended that a broader platform for expanded trade ties be inculcated through the negotiations of a broad-based Bilateral Trade and Investment Agreement (BTIA). The India-EU BTIA talks have since then discussed issues related to trade in goods and services, sanitary & phyto-sanitary measures, intellectual property rights, technical barriers to trade, dispute settlement, customs and trade facilitation and procurement among others.

Bill providing reservation to SC/ST in promotions in govt jobs introduced in RS

A Constitutional amendment bill providing for reservation to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in promotions in the government jobs was introduced in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday amidst pandemonium. As soon as the House re-assembled after an hour-long adjournment, members belonging to Samajwadi Party trooped into the well shouting slogans against the reservation even as Deputy Chairman P J Kurien asked the Minister of State for Personnel, V Narayanasamy to move the Constitution (117th Amendment) Bill, 2012.On the other side, the BJP members continued to shout slogans demanding the Prime Minister's resignation on the alleged irregularities in the allocation of coal blocks.Amidst the din, the Deputy Chairman adjourned the House till 2 PM.

International Crude Oil Price of Indian Basket Rises on 04.9.2012 to US$ 113.97/BBL

The international crude oil price for Indian Basket as computed/published today by the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) under the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas increased to US$ 113.97/barrel (bbl) on 04.9.2012. The price was higher than US$ 113.09/bbl on 3.09.2012, the last trading day.In rupee terms also, the crude oil price rose to Rs 6329.89 per bbl on 04.09.2012 as compared to Rs 6270.84 per bbl on 03.09.2012. This was due to rise in price in dollar terms and rupee depreciation with rupee-dollar exchange rate on 04.09.2012 at Rs 55.54/US$ against Rs 55.45/US$ on 03.09.2012.

Agripreneurs and Producer Organizations

The concept of an “Agripreneur” is slowly gaining ground in the agriculture sector in the country. The term entrepreneur is quite familiar; so is the term agriculturist. The agripreneur is one who plays the role of an entrepreneur in the field of agriculture.The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural development (NABARD) is in the fore front of pioneering this concept. Its Assistant General Manager at Madurai, Sankar Narayan says that NABARD is actively working with farmers federations in Usilampatti and Chellampatti to transform agriculturists into agripreneurs.

India’s Foreign Trade: July, 2012

A. EXPORTS (including re-exports)

Exports during July, 2012 were valued at US $ 22442.96 million (Rs. 124546.75 crore) which was 14.80 per cent lower in Dollar terms (6.45 per cent higher in Rupee terms) than the level of US $ 26340.73 million (Rs. 116998.69 crore) during July, 2011.Cumulative value of exports for the period April-July 2012 -13 was US $ 97646.92 million (Rs 531602.74 crore) as against US $ 102848.24 million (Rs 459162.24 crore) registering a negative growth of 5.06 per cent in Dollar terms and growth of 15.78 per cent in Rupee terms over the same period last year.

Less radiation level from telecom towers starting today

The new guidelines for lowering the radiation levels emanating from telecom towers and handsets have come into effect from today. The guidelines seek to address public health concerns. The new guidelines stipulate reduction of radiation levels to 1/10^th of the present levels for the towers while the minimum distance of a tower from a residential building should be 35 meters. The mobile handsets would also require to reduce the Specific Absorption of the radiation 12.5 times.There are over seven lakh towers for mobile phones throughout the country of which 95 per cent of them are already compliant with the new emission norms.Non-compliance of these standards will result in a penalty of Rs 5 lakh per tower, Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal said.Public health comes first. Technology must be embraced but it ultimately must be subject to public health," he said.

Transcript of PM’s on-board Press Interaction enroute to Delhi from Tehran

Opening Statement of Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh: Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, I came to Tehran to attend the NAM Summit. My speech at the Plenary Session of the Summit has already been circulated and you must have gone through it. In addition I had a meeting with the Supreme Leader, and also with President Ahmadinejad to review the state of our bilateral relations. I was particularly struck by what the Supreme Leader told me about his interest and involvement in Indian affairs. He recalled the influence that Mahatma Gandhi had on him, the role that Jawaharlal Nehru played in India’s freedom struggle, his visit to India in 1980-81, meetings with Mrs. Gandhi, visiting various other parts of our country including Hyderabad.

Ministry of Finance Notifies Advance Price Agreement (APA) Scheme

The Ministry of Finance has notified an “Advance Pricing Agreement Scheme” (Rules 10F to 10T of Income Tax Rules, 1962) vide notification No. 36/2012 dated 30-8-2012. The Finance Act, 2012 had inserted sections 92CC and 92CD in the Income Tax Act 1961 introducing the provisions of Advance Pricing Agreement (APA). The APA Scheme shall come into effect from the date of its publication in the Official Gazette, i.e. from 30.08.2012.