Junior Digest

Bollywood actor Rajesh Vivek, mainly known for his roles in hits like ‘Lagaan’ and ‘Swades’, died due to a heart attack in Hyderabad on Thursday (January 14). The 66-year-old actor was a part of many hit films including Shah Rukh Khan’s Swades, Aamir Khan starrer Lagaan, Veerana, Jodha Akbar and many more during the course of his Bollywood career.

Vivek, was first introduced by Shyam Benegal in his film ‘Junoon’ (1978)

Basically a theatre actor, he had also acted in popular television series ‘Mahabharata’, ‘Bharat Ek Khoj’ and in ‘Aghori’.

  NEW DELHI: The government is set to reduce interest rates on small savings products such as public provident fund and National Savings Certificate .
The new formula will see small savings rates linked to returns on government securities of comparable maturity, with the reduction expected to be up to 50 basis points (100 basis points equal a percentage point). There are indications that senior citizens and women will be protected with some special category schemes.

Banks are expected to follow the small savings rate cut with lower fixed deposit rates.

The Reserve Bank of India and banks have been seeking a reduction in small savings rates, arguing that PPF and other products offered higher returns when compared with fixed deposits, resulting in a flight of funds to the government schemes.

The move may trigger a fall in returns on  savings. It is seen as a reform move by the government, which recently announced a plan to end subsidies to the high-income segment.

Kathmandu: The Nepalese government has proposed formation of a four-member Eminent Persons’ Group (EPG) to review the existing bilateral agreements with India including the strategic Peace and Friendship Treaty of 1950.

The government has proposed names of four persons to form the Eminent Persons’ Group (EPG), during the cabinet meeting yesterday though no formal decision was taken to this effect, minister for Information and Communication Sherdhan Rai said.
The next cabinet meeting will take a formal decision in this regard, said Rai.
The 1950 India-Nepal Treaty of Peace and Friendship allows free movement of people and goods between the two nations and a close relationship and collaboration on matters of defense and foreign policy.
The proposal to form the EPG comes as the government prepares for Prime Minister’s visit to India scheduled for the second week of February.
Oli’s maiden visit to India comes amid great unease in bilateral relations, owing to months-long blockade of the land-locked country enforced by Indian-origin Madhesi people who are protesting Nepal’s new constitution.
The Third Joint Commission Meeting of Nepal and India that was held here in July 2014 had decided to set up the EPG with four members from each side at the request of Nepal.
The decision was also endorsed during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Nepal last year. The EPG will be authorised to look into the entire gamut of Nepal-India relations.

The Nepalese Prime Minister K P Oli’s  maiden visit to India  will take place in the next month.

The report, “Immigrants’ Growing Presence in the U.S. Science and Engineering Workforce: Education and Employment Characteristics in 2013,” goes on to add that Indians “continue to be the single largest source of such professionals populating the American workforce” even as the number of scientists and engineers residing in the United States rose from 21.6 million to 29 million. The most common fields of study for immigrant scientist and engineers in 2013 were engineering, computer and mathematical sciences and social and related sciences and over 80 per cent of the immigrant scientists and engineers were employed in 2013, the same percentage as their U.S.-born counterparts.

The rapid rise in the number of expatriate Indian technologists comes in the decade when India—concerned about ‘brain-drain’—has launched a plethora of schemes to attract highly-qualified scientists back to India. According to a report by the U.N., Indians make up the largest diaspora in the world, with 16 million of them scattered across the world. This is partly due to its sizable population of 1.2 billion and a large proportion of youth. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been seeking to convince this massive diaspora to engage more with India as well as invest in the country.

Based on a report in THE HINDU.

  St Stephen’s College students have  adopted the odd-even formula for the usage of cell phones saying the devices are “lethal” for health as well as intellectual life.

Following the Delhi Government’s 15-day trial for restricting the plying of vehicles in the national capital as per odd and even numbers, the students have decided to attempt the same for mobile phones.

The decision was taken at an assembly meeting at the college where over 70 per cent students voted in favour of the idea.

However, the implementation of the scheme is voluntary and no student will be penalised for not following the rule.

“I had given up using my cell phone last July. This is the best that I have done for myself in the recent years. It has reduced my distractions by 95 per cent, my vexation by 96.5 per cent and my headache by 99.66 per cent. The quality of my concentration has improved,” college Principal Valson Thampu said.

“Cell phones are as lethal a pollutant of our inner/ intellectual life as vehicles are of our roads or outdoor life,” he added.

Aiming to cut down air pollution in the city, the Arvind Kejriwal-led government has implemented a 15-day-long odd-even scheme, which came into force on January 1.

Agency news

Bengaluru: Infosys Ltd today reported a  6.6 per cent rise in its third quarter net profit .It raised its annual revenue growth forecast by  5 per cent.

Consolidated net profit rose to Rs 3,465 crore, or Rs 15.16 per share, in October-December as compared to Rs 3,250 crore, or Rs 14.22 a share, in the same period a year ago, Infosys said in a statement.

India’s second-largest software service exporter also raised its annual revenue growth forecast on stronger demand for high-margin automation and other services.

  Today India and Pakistan mutually agreed to a short deferment of Foreign Secretary-level talks . Meantime  India gave a  go-ahead to the visit of a Pakistan SIT  that probe Pathankot terror attack.

Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar, who would have been in Islamabad today for the talks, and his counterpart Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhary spoke to each other and it was agreed that their parleys would be rescheduled to the “very near future”.

In a break from the past, the two governments appeared to have coordinated their strategy with Islamabad not going into a denial mode with regard to involvement of Pakistani elements in the attack and apprehending JeM members. India on its part, did not call-off the talks.

Agency news.

Washington: President Barack Obama today used his final State of the Union address to paint a hopeful portrait of America under his leadership, with a resurgent economy and better standing in the world despite racial inequality and growing menace of home-grown terrorism.
“We need to reject any politics that targets people because of race or religion,” Obama, the first ever African-American President, said in his hour-long prime-time speech marked with applause for as many as 64 times.
“When politicians insult Muslims, when a mosque is vandalised, or a kid bullied, that doesn’t make us safer,” he noted.
“That’s not telling it like it is. It’s just wrong. It diminishes us in the eyes of the world. It makes it harder to achieve our goals. And it betrays who we are as a country,” Obama said, adding that a better politics doesn’t mean one has to agree on everything.
“This is a big country, different regions, different attitudes, different interests and that’s one of our strengths, too,”  he said.
“This isn’t a matter of political correctness. This is a matter of understanding just what it is that makes us strong.
The world respects us not just for our arsenal, it respects us for our diversity and our openness and the way we respect every faith,” he said.

Obama said “one of the few regrets” of his presidency was that after he ran on a message of unity and healing American politics had become more divided and resentful on his watch.
“It’s one of the few regrets of my presidency, that the rancour and suspicion between the parties has gotten worse instead of better,” he said, in his final State of the Union address.

Warning that “instability will continue for decades” in many parts of the world including Afghanistan and Pakistan, Obama said both al-Qaeda and ISIS pose a direct threat to the US and America’s foreign policy has to be focused on the threat from ISIL and Al Qaida.

“Our foreign policy must be focused on the threat from ISIL and al Qaeda, but it can’t stop there. For even without ISIL, instability will continue for decades in many parts of the world in the Middle East, in Afghanistan and Pakistan, in parts of Central America, Africa and Asia. Some of these places may become safe havens for new terrorist networks,” he said.

“Both al Qaeda and now ISIL pose a direct threat to our people, because in today’s world, even a handful of terrorists who place no value on human life, including their own, can do a lot of damage,” Obama said.

Agency News.