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Sitting outside the local court in Khalapur on Monday morning, 55-year-old Dilip Dhanavade was a broken man. A handkerchief tied over his nose and mouth, he was, however, unable to mask his fear over his son’s future. Dhanavade’s 23-year-old son Pradeep, who was a taxi driver for app-based cab services for the past three years, has ended up in police lock-up along with two journalists booked for trespassing on Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray’s farmhouse in Khalapur. A resident of Mumbai’s Mahul, an area notorious for its poor air quality and pollution, Dilip works as a plumber. He has not broken the news of his son’s arrest on September 9 to his wife, who suffers from high blood pressure and hypertension. “All my life I kept a watchful eye on my son so that he doesn’t fall into bad company. That can happen easily in the place we live. But he never went astray. He is a hard working boy. He was working as a delivery boy for a grocery chain before he bought this taxi on a loan. He has no bad habits. It’s only his luck that was bad,” said the father, unable to hold back tears. Two of his relatives accompanied him to Khalapur, a distance that Dilip had never travelled before. He held on tightly to two cloth bags, one carrying his identity documents and the other a water bottle. Read the full article

An international team of astronomers has announced the finding of phosphine gas in the atmosphere of Venus, triggering excitement about the possibility of presence of life forms on that planet. Apart from being produced in industrial processes, phosphine, a colourless, smelly gas, is known to be made only by some species of bacteria that survive in the absence of oxygen. The presence of phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus is something that was not expected and is “unexplained”. Any presence of phosphorus in that atmosphere was expected to be in oxidised forms. In a paper published in Nature Astronomy, a team of scientists have reported traces of phosphine in a concentration of approximately 20 parts per billion. Scientists have been careful to emphasise, that as of now, this is no confirmation of the presence of life on Venus. It could be getting produced by natural processes that we, as of now, are not aware of. “PH3 (phosphene) could originate from unknown photochemistry or geochemistry, or, by analogy with biological production of PH3 on earth, from the presence of life.” But as Professor Sara Seager of the Department of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who is one of the authors of the study, this discovery had raised Venus “higher up on the ladder of interesting targets” where the possible presence of life forms can be explored. Source link Read the full article

The United Arab Emirates on Monday granted emergency approval for use of a coronavirus vaccine, six weeks after human trials in the Gulf Arab state started. A phase III trial of a COVID-19 inactivated vaccine developed by Chinese state-owned pharmaceutical company Sinopham began in the UAE in July and is yet to be completed. “The vaccine will be available to our first line of defense heroes who are at the highest risk of contracting the virus,” said the National Emergency Crisis and Disaster Management Authority in a tweet. The announcement comes amid a surge in new COVID-19 cases in the UAE, which reported 1,007 cases on Saturday, its highest since the start of the pandemic. There were 777 new cases on Monday. Emergency use of the vaccine, which is still being tested, was granted after set criteria and after it had been tested on 31,000 volunteers, it said. Mild and expected side effects occurred but there have been no severe side effects, the agency said without specifying. It added a thousand people suffering from chronic diseases who took part saw no complications. Sinopharm secured approval for the trial in late June. The experimental vaccine passed Phases I and II of clinical trials with 100% of volunteers generating antibodies after two doses in 28 days, an Abu Dhabi government statement said in July. Read the full article

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) on Monday became the second Indian firm to attain a market valuation of over Rs 9 lakh crore after Reliance Industries Limited. The company’s market valuation went past Rs 9 lakh crore in early trade helped by a rally in its share price. The stock of the software services firm gained 2.91 per cent to Rs 2,442.80 — its record high — on the BSE. On the NSE, it jumped 2.76 per cent to a lifetime high of Rs 2,439.80. Helped by the surge in its share price, the company’s market valuation rose to Rs 9,14,606.25 crore on the BSE in early trade. It is the second most-valuable domestic firm in terms of market capitalisation. Meanwhile, Reliance Industries Limited is the first Indian firm to have crossed the Rs 9 lakh crore market valuation mark. The country’s most valued firm achieved this milestone in October last year. Its market valuation is currently at Rs 15,78,732.92 crore – the highest for any listed company in the country. Source link Read the full article

Attention all chocolate lovers: the world has just received its largest chocolate museum, and we have an actual and official reason to celebrate. While there are many museums around the world, this particular one in Zurich in Switzerland, is special because it opens its doors to everything chocolate, similar to the fictional Willy Wonka factory. In fact, the ‘Lindt Home of Chocolate’, which opened September 13, is also said to have its own chocolate fountain, at a whopping height of 30 feet! According to international news reports, the fountain is said to be the highlight of the museum, and will greet visitors as they walk in through the entrance. The Lindt Home of Chocolate covers a square feet of 65,000, and is believed to be complete with the world’s largest Lindt chocolate shop — ‘Chocolateria,’ some interactive exhibitions, and — as mentioned before — the world’s largest chocolate fountain, which beats its predecessor by a few feet. But unlike Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory, guests will be allowed to take some goodies home. There is an interactive museum that will make vistors experience everything about chocolate making — from cultivation to its production. Additionally, the exhibits will enable people to learn about the history of the Swiss chocolate making. Besides Lindt, it will also tell them about its famous predecessors. Read the full article

The Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly on Monday passed three amendment Bills related to labour and industrial laws in the state. The Bills will be replacing ordinances promulgated in July without any modification. The Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, in its application to Himachal Pradesh, has been amended to include non-public utility services in the section dealing with prohibition of strikes by employees and lock-outs by employers. According to another amendment in the Act, the compensation paid to a worker at the time of retrenchment has been enhanced from 15 days’ average pay to 60 days of average pay. A chapter of the Act dealing with special provisions relating to lay-off, retrenchment and closure in certain establishments has been amended so that the chapter’s provisions will now apply to industrial establishments having not less than 200 workers on an average (it was 100 workers earlier). Another Bill passed by the House was The Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Himachal Pradesh Amendment Bill, 2020. According to the amendment, the Contract Labour Act in its application to the state will now apply to every establishment in which thirty or more workers are employed as contract labour (instead of twenty or more workers before the amendment). The Factories Act, 1948, in its application to Himachal has also been amended. Read the full article

NTA NEET 2020: NEET 2020 rank predictor is an easy to use tool that helps aspirants to know about their probable rank in the exam. To predict the rank, candidates must enter the score they expect in the exam. To calculate the approximate marks, candidates can use the NEET answer key. How to use the NEET rank predictor tool? Medical aspirants can follow the steps mentioned below to use the rank predictor and predict their ranks: Step 1: Open the Rank Predictor: Click on the link: NEET Rank Predictor Step 2: Registration: Candidates should register by entering their name, email address, mobile number. Step 3: Fill exam details: Candidates should enter their expected NEET scores(mandatory), entering the application number and date of birth are optional fields. Step 4: Result: Candidates should click on ‘predict my rank’ and their expected rank would be available on the screen. Predicting the rank would be helpful for candidates as they will get to know where they stand among the other test-takers. Candidates can also check their admission chances in colleges based on their probable rank. The process to calculate the expected score To estimate the rank, it is important for candidates to know their expected scores. They can use the answer key and response sheet to calculate the marks by applying the marking scheme. Read the full article

David Miller is in awe of MS Dhoni’s finishing skills and the South African says he wants to imbibe the former India skipper’s calmness in high-pressure run chases. Miller will be playing for Rajasthan Royals in the IPL beginning September 19 after eight years with Kings XI Punjab. “I absolutely love the way Dhoni goes about his business. Certainly his calmness – you just think he’s always under control. The way he portrays himself, that’s something he’s extremely good at and I do enjoy that about him. I try and give off the same energy,” Miller told ‘ESPNcricinfo‘. Miller is a Dhoni fan but he is not oblivious to the two-time World Cup winner’s weaknesses even though he prefers to steer clear of the specifics. “…he’s got his strengths and weaknesses as a batsman and so do I. I tend to be in awe of some of his chases rather than ‘I want to bat like him’. I suppose I just want to finish games like he does. “Technique-wise and the way you go about it, we all have our own ways. I don’t think I can rate myself or put myself in a category. “We’ll see how my career unfolds and finishes and then we can look back and sort of judge. Definitely, Dhoni is one of the best finishers ever; he’s proven it many times. I love watching him play.” Miller played only eight games for KXIP over the 2017 and 2018 seasons and last year he played 10, scoring 213 runs with a strike rate of 129.87. Read the full article

Asian shares firmed on Monday on renewed hopes for a coronavirus vaccine after AstraZeneca resumed its phase-3 trial though sentiment was still cautious ahead of a big week of central bank meetings in the UK, Japan, and the United States. In a sign the positive mood will spread elsewhere, the pan-region Euro Stoxx 50 futures and German DAX futures rose 0.5% in early trade while London’s FTSE futures added 0.24%. US stock futures, the S&P 500 e-minis, jumped 1.3% after a mixed session on Wall Street last week. Most major markets across Asia were in the green with MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rising 0.9% for its second straight session of gains. Australian shares climbed 0.6% while Japan’s Nikkei added 0.7%. Chinese shares started firm but pared some of the early gains with the blue-chip index last up 0.1%. Friday marked six months since the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus a pandemic on March 11. Since then, major global economies have slipped into recession and millions have lost their jobs, prompting central banks around the world to launch unprecedented stimulus. The policy bazooka has buoyed financial markets, with the S&P500 up 22%, 10-year Treasury yields diving 20.4 basis points and the greenback sliding 3.3%. The best performing major currency has by far been the Australian dollar, up 11.9%, thanks to sound risk appetite. Read the full article

As per NASA’s Centre for Near-Earth Object studies (CNEOS), a ‘potentially hazardous’ asteroid is all set to rush past the earth at a speed of 38,620 kmph or 24,000 mph today, September 14. The size of the heavenly body is as big as two football fields put together or to the iconic ‘London Eye’. The space agency has named the asteroid ‘QL 2020’ and predicted its size to be anywhere from 53m to 120m. The rock is expected to hurtle past our planet from a distance of 6.8 million kms or 4.2 million miles. QL 2020 is currently moving at a speed of 10.5 km per second. As per data cited in Express UK from the US-based space agency, the asteroid was first found on August 14 and was then subsequently seen again on September 3 recently. The silver lining is that despite its massively dangerous size, the space agency based on its prognostication said that it will pass safely without hitting the earth. The expected distance is ten times that of between the earth and the moon. This is the second asteroid in the last 15 days that will fly past the earth after asteroid named ‘2011 ES4’ passed on September 1. As per NASA’s Centre for Near-Earth Object studies (CNEOS), a ‘potentially hazardous’ asteroid is all set to rush past the earth today. Asteroids are largely the left-over pieces and remnants of rock since the beginning of solar system which flies freely in the space. Read the full article

India CPI Inflation Rate 2020: Retail inflation growth across the country eased to 6.69 per cent in the month of August, the data released by the Ministry of Statistics & Programme Implementation (MoSPI) showed. The retail inflation which is measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for the month of July was also revised to 6.73 per cent from 6.93 per cent. Last month too, the government had revised the CPI data for June to 6.23 per cent from 6.09 per cent. Prior to June’s data, the government had not released the headline retail inflation data in April and May. However, in April, it had revised the CPI data for the month of March to 5.84 per cent from 5.91 per cent. The retail inflation has grown beyond the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) upper margin of 6 per cent. The government has mandated the Indian central bank to keep inflation within the range of 4 per cent with a margin of 2 per cent on either side. The central bank in its bi-monthly monetary policy meeting last month had kept its key interest rates on hold even as it vowed to keep policy sufficiently loose to help revive the coronavirus-battered economy. The Consumer Food Price Index (CFPI) or the inflation in the food basket eased to 9.05 per cent in the month of August. Also, the CFPI for July was revised to 9.27 per cent from 9.62 per cent, the data revealed. The growth in retail inflation was primarily due to a rise in meat and fish prices that saw a 16.50 per cent on-year rise in August. Read the full article

A Chinese company that has been monitoring over 10,000 Indian individuals and organisations, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has also reportedly amassed the personal details of more than 35,000 Australians and at least 50,000 Americans as part of a giant global database targeting influential figures. An investigation by The Indian Express has revealed that Zhenhua Data Information Technology Co. Limited, a company with links to the Chinese government, and the Chinese Communist Party, is monitoring over 10,000 Indian individuals and organisations in its global database of “foreign targets.” The range of targets in India identified and monitored in real-time by Zhenhua Data Information Technology Co. Limited is sweeping — in both breadth and depth, as per the data shared by a source with news organisations including The Indian Express, The Australian Financial Review, Italy’s Il Foglio, and The Daily Telegraph, London. According to a report by the Washington Post, officers in the US Navy and other military installations, profiles and family maps of foreign leaders, are under the radar of the company. In Australia, data related to over 35,000 Australians have been leaked from the company. Information collected includes dates of birth, addresses, marital status, along with photographs, political associations, relatives and social media IDs. Read the full article

Realme India said that it will be launching the Realme Narzo 20 series on September 21. The Realme Narzo 20 series will have three devices: Narzo 20, Narzo 20 Pro, and Narzo 20A. The virtual launch event is scheduled to start at 12:30 PM IST.  The event will be livestreamed on Realme’s Twitter, Facebook and Youtube channels. This is the first time Realme will be launching three phones under the Narzo series. The big confirmation one week ahead of the launch is that the phones will be running on Realme UI 2.0 based on Android 11. It can be interpreted from the image Narzo sent with the invite that the Pro version will support a quad-camera setup on the back and an in-screen fingerprint scanner. On the other hand, it is not clear whether the Realme Narzo will sport a triple-camera or quad-camera setup. However, both Narzo 20 and Narzo 20A will have the fingerprint scanner on the back of the phone. Realme also revealed that the Narzo 20 series will be aimed at gamers with mid-range gaming processors which will be able to run FPS games like Call of Duty Mobile, Garena Free Fire etc. According to a few leaks, the Narzo 20A is expected to come in two configurations (3GB+32GB and 4GB+64GB) and two colour variants (Victory Blue and Glory Silver). The two colour variants will be the same for Realme Narzo and Realme Narzo 20A. The Realme Narzo 20 can come in 4GB+128GB and 6GB+128GB specifications. Read the full article

Nearly 17 lakh (16,99,931) teachers received training under the government’s Nishtha programme which was launched in 2019. “A total of 23,137 Key Resource Persons (KRPs) and State Resource Persons (SRPs) and 16,99,931 school heads and teachers have been trained under NISTHA in 2019-20,” as shared by Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal in a written reply in Lok Sabha on September 14. The programme was started on August 21 with an aim to build the capacities of around 42 lakh teachers and heads of schools across the country. The ministry has also created a virtual platform for Nishtha programme — Nishtha online considering the COVID-19 pandemic situations. Apart from the ministry, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is also organising Prospective Resource Persons training programmes, and till now 1500 key resource persons were empanelled, the education minister informed. The government has also taken various steps to impart education during the CBSE Podcast- ShikshaVani. The CBSE has reduced the syllabi of major subjects for the commencing academic session. The online courses and classes are being conducted through various e-learning platforms, PM eVIDYA, Diksha, TV channels, CBSE Podcast- ShikshaVani, radio, community radio. Read the full article

Amazon will hire another 100,000 people to keep up with a surge of online orders. The company said Monday that the new hires will help pack, ship or sort orders, working in part-time and full-time roles. Amazon said the jobs are not related to its typical holiday hiring. The Seattle company reported record profit and revenue between April and June as more people turned to it during the pandemic to buy groceries and supplies. The company already had to hire 175,000 people earlier this year to keep up with the rush of orders, and last week said it had 33,000 corporate and tech jobs it needed to fill. This time around, Amazon said it needs the people at the 100 new warehouses, package sorting centers and other facilities it’s opening this month. Alicia Boler Davis, who oversees Amazon’s warehouses, said the company is offering USD 1,000 sign-on bonuses in some cities where it may be harder for it to find workers, such as Detroit, New York, Philadelphia and Louisville, Kentucky. Starting pay at Amazon is $15 an hour. Things are about to get a lot busier at Amazon’s warehouses. In addition to the holiday shopping rush, Amazon plans to hold its one of its busiest shopping days, Prime Day, in the fall this year after postponing it from July. Amazon will be monitoring whether it needs to hire more workers for the holidays, but doesn’t have anything to announce yet, Boler Davis said. Last year, it hired 200,000 ahead of the holidays. Read the full article

A spinner who relishes challenges, Australia’s Adam Zampa wants to forge a partnership with India’s Yuzvendra Chahal during the upcoming IPL, where he hopes to master the art of death bowling while playing for the Royal Challengers Bangalore. Zampa and Chahal are both wrist spinners but the Australian is eager to pick the brain of his IPL teammate when it comes to death bowling. Zampa is keen to learn the skill since he was part of skipper Aaron Finch’s unsuccessful death bowling plan in the T20 series against England recently. “I really enjoy bowling at the death, I love those pressure overs especially when the game is on the line,” said Zampa, who played two seasons for the now-defunct IPL franchise Rising Pune Supergiants. “They needed 18 to win off the last two overs (in the second T20) and I told Finchy I should bowl it. It obviously didn’t go to plan but I’m not going to change my attitude after one game. “I’ve got a really good opportunity in the IPL bowling with Chahal at RCB and I might get the opportunity to bowl those overs just because of the way the team is structured,” he was quoted as saying by cricket.com.au website. He might not have been successful in the recent matches, but Zampa enjoyed considerable success bowling at death in the Big Bash League for Melbourne Stars. But his real challenge will be to find a place in the RCB playing eleven. He would face competition from Washington Sundar and Pawan Negi, besides England all-rounder Moeen Ali. Read the full article

The Gujarat Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) booked a deputy engineer of the Public Works Department (PWD) for disproportionate assets worth Rs 53.19 lakh after a complaint was lodged against him for seeking a bribe in February, 2020. According to officials of Gujarat ACB, Vasant Chauhan (56), committed the crime of seeking bribe when he was the in charge executive engineer in the Sipu pipeline project department of PWD in Palanpur. He was later made deputy engineer (grade 2) in the Dantiwada Sipu pipeline project in June this year. However, he was suspended a month later. Chauhan has been booked under sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act after an evaluation of his assets and expenditure was done in which it was found that he had garnered Rs 53.19 lakh by misusing of his post. Chauhan is a native of Vadgam in Banaskantha. “A complaint was lodged against Chauhan that he had sought Rs 15,000 as bribe to clear payment for the construction of a wall for the canal protection under the Sipu scheme. An FIR was lodged against him at the ACB police station in Banaskantha in the matter in February this year and an investigation was launched. In the probe, property and other documents of Chauhan and his family members were analysed. It was found that the valid income of Chauhan and his family members amounted to Rs 96.13 lakh while the assets and expenditure were found at Rs 1.49 crore thereby having a DA of Rs 53.19 lakh. Read the full article