Today's Hot Stories - April 08, 2014
10 Headlines for Today(1) Mamata takes on EC, refuses to transfer officials
(2) AAP candidate pulls out from Rae Bareli
(3) Americans facing competition from India, China: Obama
(4) Rs.10 bank notes with RBI Governor’s signature
(5) Nine Kingfisher Airlines trademarks put up for sale
(6) Toyota workers switch to relay hunger strike
(7) Nidhi Chilumula breezes past Sai Samhitha
(8) Chess: Abhijeet Gupta highest ranked Indian in Dubai Open
(9) Football: Man City beats Southampton 4-1 in Premier League
(10) Party posters on autos not reflective of voters’ mood
5 Stories for Today
(1) Brooms to pakodas, candidates’ poll spend goes quirky
(2) Maduro agrees to negotiations in protest-hit Venezuela
(3) Curtains to come down on Windows XP on Tuesday
(4) Deutsche Bank chairman backs Anshu Jain
(5) Financial Scene: No policy action, but big news
(1) Brooms to pakodas, candidates’ poll spend goes quirky
Money spent on purchase of brooms (the party symbol) and party caps is shown as part of the ‘daily election expenditure’ by many Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) candidates contesting from Delhi. Both items are widely being used by them during campaigning. Candidates have also added the cost of hiring e-rickshaws and auto-rickshaws for campaigning to their poll expense accounts, besides the cost of hiring private vehicles and bikes.
The Delhi Chief Electoral Officer has been posting candidates’ “day-to-day election expenditure register” online. The campaigning will come to an end by Tuesday evening and the money spent so far has not just gone into pamphlets and transportation, but also in providing refreshments or hiring of cooks. The maximum a candidate is allowed to spend is Rs 70 lakh.
Anand Kumar, AAP candidate from Northeast Delhi, has shown daily expenses varying between Rs 280 and Rs 800 on brooms. Another Rs 1,000 has been spent on caps. Besides, expenses on bedsheets and pillows, too, have been mentioned in the daily expenditure sheet.
AAP’s Northwest Delhi candidate Rakhi Birla has shown expenses of Rs 37,500 on purchase of 25,000 caps and another Rs 7,000 on hiring of a dance group. Birla also spent Rs 1,12,360 on an SMS pack.
AAP candidate from West Delhi Jarnail Singh also mentions the money spent on purchase of brooms as part of his poll expenses — his online poll register shows he bought 10 brooms at Rs 15 each.
He spent Rs 1.32 lakh on e-rickshaws over 10 days and also held a car-and-bike rally in his constituency, spending over Rs 10,000 on hiring vehicles. AAP’s East Delhi candidate Rajmohan Gandhi spent Rs 16,500 on auto-rickshaws in a single day in an attempt to “campaign like the aam aadmi”.
Parvesh Sahib Singh Verma, BJP’s candidate from West Delhi, held a hawan the same day as he filed his nomination, March 21, and paid Rs 15,240 for hawan samagri and Rs 2,100 as pandit dakshina. Congress candidate from the constituency Mahabal Mishra shows money spent on T-shirts in his expenses, having paid Rs 10,500 for 200 pieces along with an additional Rs 52,000 on caps.
Congress candidate from Northwest Delhi Krishna Tirath shows expenses on “pakodas, samosas and tea” served by her during campaigning under poll expenses while in Chandni Chowk constituency, Congress’ Kapil Sibal bought “leaf and paper face masks” for Rs 14,438.
Source: The Indian Express
(2) Maduro agrees to negotiations in protest-hit Venezuela
President Nicolas Maduro agreed to meet with a Venezuelan opposition delegation on Tuesday, after a fresh push from top diplomats from across South America.
In just over two months, 39 people have died in clashes between security forces and protesters angered by soaring crime, high inflation and shortages demonstrators blame on Maduro's elected, heavily state-led socialist government.
One problem is that only a small part of those opposing Maduro's government and policies have so far agreed to talk. University students have led protests, and organized political foes include both moderate and radical wings.
"We had quite a long conversation," Maduro said yesterday after the meeting with eight South American foreign ministers.
"They proposed a meeting tomorrow with the opposition delegation, and I agreed."
In this round, the more moderate Democratic Unity Roundtable opposition coalition has said it will join Maduro for talks. MUD seeks change without unseating Maduro.
"I hope that (MUD leaders) do not backtrack, and that they sit down at the table," Maduro added.
Some other, more radical opposition members who sought to use street protests to topple Maduro have been jailed.
Maduro, the elected heir to late long-term leader Hugo Chavez, has lashed out at the demonstrations, branding them a "fascist" US-backed plot to overthrow his government.
Yet Venezuela's attorney general admitted last month that demonstrators have been abused during weeks of protests and dozens of complaints, including allegations of murder leveled at the police, are being investigated.
Harvard-educated economist Leopoldo Lopez is being held in a military prison since his February 18 arrest in the midst of opposition rallies against Maduro, who has faced near-daily demonstrations since early February.
Conservative Latin American lawmakers meanwhile launched an effort with the International Court of Justice in the Hague to have Maduro charged with crimes against humanity, they The request, citing evidence of crimes against humanity during the protests, was filed by lawmakers Cornelia Schmidt-Liermann (with Propuesta Republicana de Argentina), Adrian Oliva (with Convergencia Nacional de Bolivia) and Cecilia Chacon (Fuerza Popular de Peru).
Source: The Times of India
(3) Curtains to come down on Windows XP on Tuesday
Customers will no longer receive new security updates, hotfixes, free or paid assisted support options or online technical content updates for their XP OS.
Microsoft will stop technical support for its most popular operating system (OS) Windows XP globally from Tuesday, bringing down curtains on the software giant’s longest running OS.
From Tuesday, customers will no longer receive new security updates, hotfixes, free or paid assisted support options or online technical content updates for their XP OS.
Windows XP, which was launched in October 2001, is three generations behind the latest operating system Windows 8 that hit markets in October 2012. The current XP version is called Windows XP Service Pack 3.
Microsoft will also stop automatic updates and Microsoft Security Essentials for XP from April 8.
“There is a sense of urgency because after April 8, Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) customers will no longer receive new security updates, non-security hotfixes, free or paid assisted support options or online technical content updates,” Microsoft Director (Trustworthy Computing division) Tim Rains had said earlier in a blog post.
This means that running Windows XP when the product is obsolete (after support ends) will increase the risk of technology being affected by cybercriminals attempting to do harm, he had said.
In February this year, the US-based firm had said its PC install base for large enterprises in India is about 4 million units, of which around 84 per cent migrated from Windows XP.
The tech giant had indicated that a number of ATMs are yet to be upgraded and such cash vending machine may face security risk. The number of ATMs using Windows XP is higher as compared to 16 per cent PCs which need upgrades.
There are roughly about 100,000 ATMs in India and many of them are running Windows XP. They have the same support policy and will be out of support, something which the RBI guidelines also referred.
Last month, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had warned that banking operations, including ATM services, may be hit as support from Microsoft for Windows XP operating system will end from April 8 and had asked banks to take immediate steps.
However, Indian Banks Association (IBA) chief executive M V Tanksale had said only old ATMs might face some problems, while the newer machines run on other platforms.
Source: The Hindu
(4) Deutsche Bank chairman backs Anshu Jain
Deutsche Bank has backed its India-born co-CEO Anshu Jain, amid reports that the German bank was looking at his replacement, saying he is doing an “excellent job”.
“The supervisory board stands behind the management board 100 per cent. Anshu Jain and Jurgen Fitschen are doing an excellent job. Since their appointment as co-CEOs, they have made a number of business decisions that have put the bank back on the right track,” Deutsche Bank Chairman Paul Achleitner German magazine Der Spiegel in an interview.
“We have a strong management team whose efforts deserve respect. And we, the supervisory board, are there to provide oversight and advice,” he said.
He said, “We remain loyal to our employees. People are still presumed innocent in this country until proven otherwise.”
Mr Jain became co-CEO of Deutsche Bank, Germany’s largest lender, on June 1, 2012. He and Mr Fitschen have introduced a three-year strategy aimed at cutting costs and improving earnings.
Deutsche Bank is working through a list of investigations that have resulted from the global financial crisis.
Recently, it settled a 12-year legal battle with the heirs of media mogul Leo Kirch by agreeing to pay about 925 million euros.
Asked if the supervisory board is responsible for making appointments to the bank’s top management positions, Mr Achleitner said it follows and supports the work of the management board with a critical but constructive eye.
Source: The Economic Times
(5) Financial Scene: No policy action, but big news
The monetary policy statement of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) presented on March 1is significant in several ways. The fact that there was no change in monetary or liquidity measures did not surprise any one.
This is one policy statement whose rationale could be easily understood. As Governor Raghuram Rajan said at the press conference, the only thing surprising about today was the lack of surprise.
The RBI’s inaction did not make it a non-event. Part B of the RBI statement, dealing with developmental and regulatory issues, catalogues activities that are critical for the financial sector. Despite their importance, they were discussed only in the annual and half-yearly policy statements. It is hoped that the RBI will make this a regular feature in all its bi-monthly statements. The next one will be on July 3.
There were some doubts as to whether the RBI could have effected an interest rate cut in this election season. The argument went like this. With the model code already in force, does the RBI have the leeway, for instance, to change the repo rate when the government is prevented from making any policy announcement?
Own conviction
The RBI’s reference to the Election Commission on new bank licences seemed to lend credence to that view. However, while the central bank was playing it safe at that time, it was in no way constrained in cutting the repo rate or the CRR (Cash Reserve Ratio), if it had to. In other words, it was not some external compulsion in the form of Election Commission diktats, but the RBI’s own conviction to maintain the status quo that carried the day.
Even on bank licences, the RBI, having secured the Election Commission’s go ahead, has said that it will not wait until a new government is formed. Indeed, the first two in-principle clearances were given the very next day to IDFC and Bandhan Financial Services Private Limited.
The important message is that the monetary policy document is an economic and regulatory statement, and there is no reason why even in the run up to the polls, it should acquire a political colour.
The rationale for the policy stance is always rooted in the evolving macro-economic situation. Economic growth is poised to go up from below 5 per cent to around 5.5 per cent (in a range of 5 to 6 per cent) in 2014-15. Factors that may pull back GDP growth include unsatisfactory monsoons, uncertainty in the setting up of minimum support prices, and the new government’s approach to macroeconomic problems such as the fiscal deficit.
On the positive side, easing of domestic supply-side bottlenecks and clearance of stalled projects will help pick up activities. The current account deficit has narrowed considerably on the back of sustained forex inflows. Some deft moves, on the part of the government, have helped.
The RBI, which has set the CPI inflation target at 8 per cent for January, 2015, enumerates several upside risks: vegetable prices shooting up again, global commodity prices rising once again due to economic recovery in the advanced economies and so on. But there is an emphatic commitment on keeping the economy on a disinflationary glide path that is intended to hit 8 per cent CPI inflation by January 2015, and to 6 per cent a year later.
It is in this context that the RBI gives a kind of assurance that if inflation decelerates as intended, there will not be any need to tighten monetary policy. Explaining the reasons behind holding rates, it says that past rate increases should be allowed to work through the system.
The Urjit Patel Committee’s report figures prominently in the statement. Its suggestion to reduce liquidity access to overnight repos while making a corresponding increase in term repos has been accepted.
Other recommendations accepted include adoption of CPI as the key measure, explicit recognition of the ‘glide path’ for disinflation and transition to a bi-monthly monetary policy cycle.
For markets, the inflation-indexed bonds are to be made more customer-friendly. Foreign investors will be encouraged to invest more, and for that purpose entry costs will be eased and the risks from volatility will be reduced.
The problem of bad loans looms large over the banking system. The RBI will constantly review the measures put in place, and make necessary adjustments to the policy framework.
It is clear that many of the non-monetary policy measures will figure prominently in the bi-monthly policy statements.
Source: Hindustan Times
Disclaimer: All news stories and content sourced from freely available material on the internet. All sources are acknowledged.
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