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Kuwait, seven of the eight Indian navy veterans who were sentenced to death on 'espionage' charges, heaped praise on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying they wouldn't have been freed had it for the sustained diplomatic efforts at his behest to secure their release. Their death sentence was later commuted to an extended prison term following sustained diplomatic interventions and legal assistance from New Delhi. Relieved to finally walk free, the seven former Navy officers raised chants of 'Bharat Mata ki Jai' after arriving at the Delhi airport in the early hours of Monday.

Indian Navy veterans, previously sentenced to prison terms in Qatar, have been released and returned to India, marking a significant diplomatic achievement for New Delhi. The Ministry of External Affairs confirmed the return of seven out of the eight veterans, who had faced dire legal circumstances in Qatar. Who are the eight ex-Navy veteran? The roster of the detained veterans comprises esteemed naval officers and a sailor, each with a distinct professional journey.

India, eight veterans of the Indian Navy who were sentenced to death in Qatar, were released by Doha on Monday. The capital punishment was commuted to an extended prison term earlier following diplomatic intervention by New Delhi. Amid desperate pleas by the anxious kin of the Navy veterans to secure their release and safe passage back to their homeland, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had assured that it would mobilise all diplomatic channels and arrange legal assistance to bring them back.

NEW DELHI : The final report on farm laws by a government-appointed committee will only be ready in a few months, said a member of the panel, as farmers geared up for a protest this week to press long-standing demands over MSP and other farm-related issues. The member who did not wish to be named said the committee that was constituted two years ago to address farmers’ grievances, including on minimum support prices (MSP), is trying to forge a consensus at the earliest. Because of the delay, farmers from Punjab and Haryana are planning to march to Delhi on Tuesday.

NEW DELHI : A large number of Union ministries had utilised only about two-thirds of their revised budgetary allocations for 2023-24 in the first nine months of the financial year. The actual total expenditure between April and December was ₹30.41 trillion, against the revised allocation of ₹44.90 trillion for 56 ministries, the Union finance ministry said in a statement on ministry-wise utilisation of the Budget allocation for FY24. The statement was a part of the government’s response to questions at the Rajya Sabha last week.

Xiaomi, which has the biggest share in India's smartphone market at 18%, also asks in the letter dated Feb. 6 that India consider offering manufacturing incentives and lowering import tariffs for certain smartphone components. The Chinese company assembles smartphones in India with mostly local components and the rest imported from China and elsewhere.

NEW DELHI : The Ayodhya Ram temple consecration ceremony on 22 January brought substantial advertising and viewership gains for news channels, particularly those focused on the Hindi heartland. The spike was comparable to a general election counting day, media industry experts said. While viewership, split with digital platforms (mainly YouTube), is estimated to have witnessed a spike of 10-15% on linear TV alone, advertising rates were three to four times higher, especially for mass-market brands, most of which found space on L-bands operating during the coverage of the ceremony, with news channels taking fewer ad breaks.

India's net direct tax collection stood at Rs 15.60 lakh crore as of February 10, reaching approximately 80 per cent of the revised target set for the entire financial year, the official government data showed on Sunday. On February 1, 2024, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman revised direct tax collection aim to Rs. 19.45 lakh crore for the current financial year, higher than Rs 16.61 lakh crore collected in fiscal 2023 and Rs 14.08 lakh crore in fiscal 2022. In January, India's net direct tax collection had witnessed a 19 per cent increase on an annual basis to Rs 14.70 lakh crore.

Russian envoy to India, Denis Alipov, said on Saturday while his country remains New Delhi's «reliable and time-tested friend», the US is trying to threaten the relationship with sanctions. «In India, Russia enjoys a solid reputation as a reliable, sincere, well-intentioned, time-tested friend. Such an image was initially shaped due to the major contribution of the USSR to Indian socio-economic development, and it largely persists to this day,» he said. In an interview with the RT news agency, the Russian envoy added, «US officials who come here do not hesitate to directly state that they are pursuing the goal of tearing New Delhi away from Moscow. They are even making threats with secondary sanctions. Some Indian partners are forced to exercise caution, sometimes, frankly speaking, excessively, but there are also a significant number of those for whom such an approach is unacceptable.»

Haldwani | New Delhi | Lucknow: Six people were killed in the violence that broke out over the demolition of an «illegally built» madrasa, officials said on Friday as curfew remained enforced in Uttarakhand's Haldwani town. Seven people, including a journalist, were under treatment at three different hospitals. Three of them were said to be in a serious condition. Others had been discharged. A day after violence in Banbhoolpura locality of Haldwani town, the administration started examining the video footage captured by CCTVs to identify the miscreants who attacked the administration team, including cops. On Thursday, a district administration team went to Banbhoolpura locality to remove encroachments from government lands. The team demolished illegal structures, including a madrasa. Miscreants attacked the policemen and government officials, besides destroying several vehicles parked outside the police station, the officials said, adding they not only pelted stones and lobbed patrol bombs, but also attacked the police station in the area. Several vehicles, parked outside the police station, were set on fire.

₹1,073 crore in the third quarter, mirroring the lift in profits and volumes seen by listed peers Bajaj Auto & TVS Motor Company. The company also reported a 21% increase in revenue from operations to ₹9,723.73 crore in Q3FY24, versus ₹8,030.98 crore in Q3FY23. The company said it retailed 1.4 million units during the 32-day festive period during the quarter, its highest for any festive period so far.

Iran. New Delhi may see the attack as an opportunity to improve ties with Tehran and open a second front against Pakistan. That would be a mistake. India needs only to consider the aftermath of the October 7 terrorist attacks by Tehran-backed Hamas in Israel to realise this. That assault has led to a growing chain of military conflicts that negatively affect India's vital national interests in trade, energy and transport. Here's how Iran's actions and policies are undermining India's interests:

NEW DELHI : Metals and mining giant Vedanta Resources Ltd on Friday said it has made an upfront payment of $779 million to its bondholders and completed repayments as part of the debt restructuring exercise. The upfront payment to the bondholders was made on Wednesday, Vedanta Resources Ltd (VRL) said in a statement. VRL has completed repayments to its bondholders on February 7, 2024, in line with the consents it received earlier in the year in which maturities of USD 3.2 billion in bonds were successfully extended to 2029, the statement said.

NEW DELHI : ArcelorMittal Nippon Steel and Indian Oil Corp (IOC) informed the Supreme Court on Friday that they have agreed to appoint an arbitrator to settle their dispute involving Essar Steel. Both sides urged the apex court to set aside the Delhi high court's judgment, which has been challenged in the current petition. The legal counsels requested the court to refrain from passing further orders in the case.

NEW DELHI : Intel has no plans to set up a semiconductor fabrication unit in India in the near future and is unlikely to expand its manufacturing capacities for other products, said the company’s India managing director Santosh Viswanathan. The technology major is instead focusing on enabling ecosystem players in the production linked incentive (PLI) scheme to scale up electronics manufacturing chains in the country, which he said would lead to more job creation. “At this point in time, we don’t have any plans to do a fab or build any manufacturing capacity in India at this stage, but it doesn’t mean the engagement stops.

NEW DELHI : The ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government and the opposition Congress party locked horns on Thursday, over a paper tabled in the Lok Sabha by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman accusing the previous United Progressive Alliance regime of undermining the country’s macroeconomic fundamentals, and the Congress hitting back at the government citing price rice and unemployment. The debate over the economic track record before and after 2014 highlighted major shocks that India’s economy underwent under both regimes, how the respective governments dealt with them, the effectiveness of the fiscal stimulus, given as well as the persisting issues of price rice and job creation not being commensurate with the demand from a large working age population.

NEW DELHI—Butter chicken is among India’s most famous culinary exports. The fragrant, creamy curry has been adapted into pizzas in the U.S., a poutine topping in Canada and a pie filling in Australia. There is a “World Butter Chicken Day." Now butter chicken is at the center of a saucy real-life drama roiling India.

NEW DELHI : Goods and Services Tax (GST) revenue collection of central and state governments will continue to grow at a faster pace than nominal GDP growth rate till very high tax compliance level is achieved, after which, the tax on consumption will grow in sync with the rate of economic expansion, Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs (CBIC) chairman Sanjay Kumar Agarwal said in an interview. Agarwal said that the nominal GDP rate will be dictating growth in GST revenue although presently there is a tax buoyancy above 1, which indicates compliance level is going up.

NEW DELHI : The Union government is discussing a proposal for state-run cooperatives to procure maize, or corn, from farmers from the next Rabi season to meet its ambitious ethanol-blended fuel target, a top official said. If the proposal goes through, the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd (Nafed) and the National Cooperative Consumers’ Federation Of India Ltd (NCCF) will procure maize from farmers at state-set guaranteed prices, Union food and public distribution secretary Sanjeev Chopra told Mint in an interview. Currently, biofuels such as ethanol are made primarily from sugarcane and grains such as rice and maize.

Indians now constitute one-tenth of all US visa applicants globally, with demand skyrocketing across all visa categories, witnessing a remarkable 60 per cent surge compared to the previous year. «In 2023, the US Embassy and Consulates in India processed a record-smashing 1.4 million US visas. Demand across all visa classes was unprecedented, with a 60 per cent increase in applications compared to 2022. Indians now represent one out of every ten US visa applicants around the world,» a statement by the US Embassy and Consulates in India said. Visitor visas (B1/B2) experienced a notable resurgence, representing the second-highest number of applications in the history of the US Mission, surpassing 700,000. The United States has ramped up staff in India whoch have led to a remarkable reduction of appointment wait times from an average of 1,000 days to a mere 250 days nationwide, across all visa categories. The US consular team in India achieved another milestone by issuing over 140,000 student visas in 2023, setting a record for the third consecutive year. Mumbai, New Delhi, Hyderabad, and Chennai emerged as the top four student visa processing posts globally, solidifying Indian students as the largest cohort of international graduate students in the United States, constituting over a quarter of the one million foreign students in the country.

Arvind Kejriwal announced on Monday, "...those who install solar panels on their rooftop will get zero electricity bills, no matter how many units of electricity they consume." He said this while introducing the Delhi government's new solar policy, which is expected to be “notified within 10 days". "The Delhi government has released a new solar policy, Solar Policy 2024....