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On 17th December, Tuesday 2019issue, page 1 & 8 will be

dedicated for QATAR National Day(18th December, 2019) felicitations

Seagull International chosen as Brand of year 2019 by CEO magazine

Dr Sureshkumar Madhusudhanan, MD, Seagull International HR

MUMBAI: The CEO maga-zine has selected Seagull International HR Consul-

tants as the Brand of the Year 2019.

Established three de-cades ago, Seagull Inter-

national is an ADNOC Cer-tified and an ISO certified Human Resource Consul-tants company accredited with Ministry of External Affairs, Government of In-dia. Seagull International isa trusted name in the job mar-ket of providing manpower from India and Nepal to clients in the Middle East, Africa, Europe and Asia-pacific. The journey began from a modest firm of tours and travels and later entered into overseas recruitment 33 years ago. Today, Seagull has grown as a recruitment major not only in India but in the Gulf as (Contd. on page 2)

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohamed bin Za-yed with Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov (centre) and other guests at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

Salaries in India likely to rise by 9.2pcNEW DELHI: Employees in India are expected to gain a 9.2pc salary growth in 2020, highest in Asia, but inflation may play a spoiler as real-wage salaries in the country is anticipated to be just five per cent.

According to Korn Ferry Global Salary Forecast, In-dia’s salary growth for 2020 stood at 9.2pc down from 10pc last year while real-wage after adjusting infla-tion may remain constant at five per cent in 2020. The report added that India has emerged as the leader of salary growth projection in Asia.

“India has posted a strong growth despite real wages taking a hit globally. With current economic sce-nario and progressive re-

forms by the government, there is a sense of cautious optimism across sectors in India that continues to show high salary increments,” Korn Ferry India Chairman Navnit Singh said.

As per the forecast, sala-ries are predicted to grow at a rate of around 4.9pc glob-ally in 2020. With a global inflation rate prediction of around 2.8pc , the real-wage salary rise prediction stood at 2.1pc. The highest real wage growth is expected in Asia with salaries forecast to grow by 5.3pc in 2020 and real-wage salaries are expected to be 3.1pc with an inflation rate of 2.2pc.

“India’s projected aver-age salary increment has seen an average growth of 9.2pc for 2020 and with

low inflation, the real wage increased at 5.1pc which is amongst the highest glob-ally”, Roopank Chaudhary, associate client partner – Korn Ferry India said. He further noted that in line with slower and lower in-crements across the board, the companies will contin-ue to differentiate their top performers high potentials and critical talent sharply.Fixed salary

“Given the increasing cost pressures on the busi-nesses, fixed salary sees a slow growth whereas high performers will continue to see a steady growth in total remuneration including per-formance incentives (short and long-term),” he said. Across Asian countries, In-donesia is likely to have a sal-

ary growth of 8.1pc whereas Malaysia, China and Korea are expected to have a sal-ary growth of five per cent, six per cent and 4.1pc re-spectively. The lowest salary growth is expected in Japan and Taiwan at two per cent and 3.9pc respectively.

The data was drawn from Korn Ferry’s pay da-tabase which contains data for more than 20 million job holders in 25,000 organisa-tions across more than 130 countries. It shows predict-ed salary increases as fore-cast by global HR leaders for 2020 and compares them with the predictions made at this time last year regard-ing 2019. It also compares them with 2020 inflation forecasts from the Econo-mist Intelligence Unit.

Kuwait hires nurses from India, PhilippinesKUWAIT: The Ministry of Health (MoH) is hiring a “huge batch of nurses” from India and the Philippines who are due to join service in various public hospi-tals and clinics by Jan after their arrival by the end of December, well-informed health sources said.

Speaking on the con-dition of anonymity, the sources added that MoH would need over 700 nurs-

WASHINGTON: With a 17.5 million-strong dias-pora across the world, India has the largest international migrant population of any country in the world and it received the highest remit-tance (US$78.6 billion) from Indians living abroad yet again, according to the UN migration agency.

The International Organ-isation for Migration (IOM) released its “Global Migra-tion Report 2020” which shows that the number of in-ternational migrants in 2019 is now estimated at over 270 million and the top destina-tion remains the US, at near-ly 51 million. The 10th edi-tion of the IOM report noted that the total number of mi-

INDIAN DIASPORA WORLD’S LARGEST

India receives highest remittance of $78.6b

grants represented just a tiny fraction of the world’s popu-lation, although it is a 0.1pc increase from its last report published two years ago.

“The vast majority of people globally (96.5pc) are estimated to be residing in the country in which they were born,” IOM’s Global Migration Report 2020 said. “IOM has an obligation to demystify the complexity and diversity of human mo-bility,” IOM Director Gener-al António Vitorino said. “As this report shows, we have a continuously growing and improving body of data and information that can help us make better sense of the basic features of migration in increasingly uncertain

times,” he added. India continued to be

the largest country of origin of international migrants. It had the largest number of migrants living abroad (17.5 million), followed by Mexico (11.8m) and China (10.7m). The top destination country remained the US (50.7 mil-lion international migrants).

The report also noted that international remit-tances increased to $689 billion in 2018. The top three remittance recipi-ents were India ($78.6b), China ($67.4b) and Mexico ($35.7b). The US remained the top remittance-sending country ($ 68b) followed by the UAE ($44.4b) and Saudi Arabia ($36.1b).

Salaries in Saudi to increase by 4.8pcRIYADH: Employees in Saudi Arabia can expect an increase in base salary of 4.8pc across industries in 2020, slightly higher than the 4.5pc projection for the UAE, a survey from global human resources consul-tancy Mercer found.

More than half of em-ployers (52pc) said they plan to increase their head-count next year while 38pc are looking to maintain staffing levels, according to

the company’s total remu-neration study of over 470 companies in the kingdom.

“Saudi is constantly look-ing at new approaches to further progress and develop the workforce. In addition to annual increases in base sal-ary, we have noticed an in-creasing number of talented Saudi youth being placed in leadership positions. This is key in creating a sustainable economy,” said Basem Sa-mara, career products leader

at Mercer in Saudi Arabia.Saudi Arabia’s economy,

the largest in the Arab world, has suffered in recent years because of low oil prices and austerity measures aimed at reducing the budget deficit. However, IMF expects the country’s gross domestic product to grow 2.2pc next year, as the kingdom presses on with economic reforms and diversification. Employ-ees in the Emirates enjoyed a 4.5pc increase in base sal-ary in 2019, according to the UAE results of Mercer’s

study, which covered a total of 18 countries across the Mena region. Employees in Saudi Arabia had the same pickup in salary this past year. In Saudi Arabia, the highest increase forecast for 2020 is in the life sciences and high tech industries at five per cent. The energy industry continues to see some of the lowest increases in salaries with a projected 3.5pc increase next year. Other industries covered included consumer goods, manufacturing and services.

Indian varsity educationin Qatar from next yearDOHA: A long wait for the Indian parents for affordable, quality higher education in Qatar for their children seems to be ending next year. DPS MIS Group says they are opening colleges offering courses in arts, science, commerce and lib-eral arts in 2020. DPS said an MoU was signed to this effect between Savitribai Phule Pune University vice-chancellor Dr Nitin Karmalkar and Milestone International Education chairman Ali A Latif Al Mesned. MIE executive committee president Hassan Chougule called it a key achievement for the DPS MIS Group, Qatar. “In association with Moham-med Bin Hammam and Ali A Latif Al Mesned, we are pro-viding pre-KG to college degrees now,” he said. It’s a “com-plete educational solution to all parents and residents of Qatar and the Indian community in particular.”

SPPU registrar Dr Prafulla Pawar, Qatar Ambassador to India Mohammad Al Khater, Qatar’s Ministry of Education undersecretary Dr Ibrahim Al Nuaimi and other ministry representatives were also present. The signing took place on the sidelines of FICCI International Higher Education Conference held at Vigyan Bhavan in Delhi.

es to operate the new hos-pitals due to be launched soon including the new Al-Sabah Hospital, the infec-tious diseases hospital and some new clinics in various areas.

Further, the sources ex-plained that the nurses had been contracted through private companies while some of them were directly contracted by MoH. “Hiring nurses through companies

will help avoid violating labour rights as MoH will be responsible to make sure accommodation is provided and monthly salaries are regularly paid without de-lay,” the sources explained. The sources also stressed that MoH would immedi-ately deduct any delayed or unpaid salaries from the concerned companies’ de-posit with the ministry in order to pay the nurses.

JEDDAH: Minister of Mi-nority Affairs Mukhtar Ab-bas Naqvi has revealed that Haj 2020 will be 100pc dig-ital stressing it as the new initiative in their constant efforts to provide a seam-less Haj experience to In-dian pilgrims.

“As far as Haj 2020 is concerned, I think India is the first country which has made the whole Haj pro-cess digital. This year the application part is online and application from all over the country will be on-line,” Naqvi said while ad-dressing a press conference at the Consulate General of India here.

Members of the delega-

India’s Haj process to be digitaltion Jan-e-Alam, additional secretary (Haj) in the Min-istry of Minority Affairs Sheikh Jina Nabi, acting chairman of Haj Committee of India Satyendra Kumar Mishra, joint secretary in Ministry of Civil Aviation Dr. Maqsood Ahmad Khan, CEO in Haj Committee of India Nijamuddin, director (Haj) in Ministry of Minor-ity Affairs, attended the press conference.Also in at-tendance were Indian Am-bassador Dr. Ausaf Sayeed, Consul General Md. Noor Rahman Sheikh and Consul Haj Y Sabir.

Naqvi said: “In order for a synchronised digital Haj, private Haj group operators

too, will be using the digi-tised process and a special portal has been dedicated for them. All information relating to Haj, about pack-ages and other things, will be available on the portal.

“Till now 1.8 lakh on-line application has been received by the Haj Com-mittee of India. The last date for the completion of the nomination was Dec 5, but with some states re-questing further extension of the date the Haj Commit-tee will discuss, consider and decide on this matter.”

The minister, at the out-set, thanked Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman (Contd. on page 2)

GCC Supreme Council meeton Dec 10RIYADH: The leaders of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) for Arab States will hold the GCC Supreme Council 40th session in Ri-yadh on Tuesday, Dec10, under the chairmanship of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Saudi King Salman, according to GCC Secretary General Dr Abdul Latif Al-Zayani.

Al-Zayani said: “The GCC leaders will discuss a number of important issues in the GCC joint action, the achievements in the frame-work of the GCC integration and co-operation in politi-cal, defence, economic and legal fields, and reports and recommendations submit-ted by relevant specialised ministerial committees and the General Secretariat.”

2 EMIGRATION Tuesday, December 03, 2019

Published by IPEPCIL Publications LtdRNI No.: MAHENG/2018/76663

Publisher: Supreet M.J.Editor : E.L. VaidyanathanVolume No.: 2, Issue: 16

Published at: Office No. 1001, 10th Floor,Navjivan Commercial Premises Co-op. Society Ltd.,Lamington Road, (Dr.D.B.Marg), Mumbai Central,

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Road, Tardeo, Mumbai-400 034, Maharashtra, India.

King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden being received by Minister of State for Envi-ronment Babul Supriyo on their arrival, in New Delhi.

NEW DELHI: India’s wheat production could jump to a second consecutive annual record in 2020 as the wettest monsoon in 25 years is set to help farmers in expanding the area under the winter-sown crop while also boost-ing yields, officials said.

But that higher produc-tion would add to India’s already swelling invento-ries, potentially forcing the world’s second-largest wheat producer to ramp up procure-ment of the grain from farm-ers and provide incentives for overseas sales to support local prices. “The area under wheat and yields would rise due to good rainfall. We can certainly produce more than last year’s record produc-tion,” said Gyanendra Singh, director at the state-run In-dian Institute of Wheat and

Road mishap kills two Indian students

India’s wettest monsoon in 25 yearscould lift wheat output to record high

WASHINGTON: Two Indian students were killed in a hit-and-run accident in South Nashville, Tennessee on Thanksgiving night. Judy Stanley (23) and Vybhav Gopisetty (26) were graduate students of the Tennessee State University (TSU) and were pursuing food science degrees in the College of Agriculture, the univer-sity said. The university stu-dents have raised-- through a GoFundMe Page-- more than $42,000 for their last rights and funeral in India.

According to the local police, Stanley and Gopisetty died in an apparent hit-and-run incident on the night of

Nov 28. Stanley was seeking a master’s, Gopisetty, a doc-torate. David Torres (26), the owner of the GMC pickup truck involved the double-fatal crash on Nolensville Pike near Harding Place, surrendered before the po-lice, Metro Nashville Police Department said. “Torres would not answer questions. Officers took a DNA sample. Investigation continuing,” the police said.

According to the police, Torres’ vehicle crashed into a Nissan Sentra, in which the two Indian students were travelling. The pickup truck was speeding and ran a red light when it hit the passenger

side of the Sentra, witnesses said according to ABC-affili-ate News 9.The car went off the road and through a fence before slamming into a tree on the Walmart property.

Stanley and Gopisetty succumbed to injuries and their families have been notified, police said, adding that Torres ran away from the scene. According to eyewitness Louis Mireles, he was walking to the bus stop when he heard it happen and saw the GMC driver run away from the scene.

“Boom boom like that and I looked backward. It was right there I would’ve been dead right there, but

something told me to step back,” local News 4 quoted him as saying.”They’re dead but we are going to make them alive again, so people get their chance in court get him because that guy ran... he didn’t even care about their lives,” Mireles said. Bharat Pokharel, Associate Professor at the Department of Agricultural and Environ-mental Sciences, College of Agriculture said the students were “humble, innocent, and hardworking” with a “pros-perous future”. “I could not believe what had happened to the lives of these two young energetic scientists,” he said in a Facebook Post.

Barley Research. India grew 102.19 million tonnes of wheat in 2019.

The country received monsoon rains during the June-Sept season that were 10pc above average and the rainfall continued during Oct and Nov, increasing soil moisture levels required for crop sowing. Rainfall also lifted the water level in India’s key reservoirs to 86pc of capacity compared with 61pc a year ago and a 10-year average of 64pc, according to government data. Only one wheat crop is grown in India each year, with planting starting in late Oct and harvesting in March.

Farmers are inclined to expand the area under wheat as its prices are more stable than any other crop due to

government buying, said Harish Galipelli, head of commodities and curren-cies at Inditrade Derivatives & Commodities in Mumbai. New Delhi sets minimum support prices (MSP) for nearly two dozen crops to set a benchmark, but state agencies mainly buy rice and wheat at those prices. For 2020, India has lifted the price at which it buys locally produced new-season wheat by 4.6pc to Rs 19,250 rupees a tonne. “After the hike in MSP, wheat planting has become even more attractive for farmers,” Galipelli said.

For the time being, deal-ers say wheat exports from India next year would be dif-ficult because of their com-paratively high cost. With the new MSP setting, export prices would be above $300

a tonne on a free-on-board basis, while supplies from the competing countries are available below $250 a tonne, said one Mumbai-based dealer with a global trading firm. “India could easily produce more than 100 million tones but could not export even one million tonnes unless government provides subsidy for ex-ports,” the dealer said. India exported 226,225 tonnes wheat in the 2018/19 fiscal year that ended on March 31, compared with a record 6.5 million tonnes in 2012/13, according to government data. Higher production and negligible exports could force the government to increase procurement from farmers to ensure prices stay at or above the MSP, said Galipelli at Inditrade.

US presidential aspirant makes Masala DosaWASHINGTON: A video of Indian-origin US Demo-cratic Presidential aspirant

Kamala Harris cooking up a storm with popular co-median, actress and script-writer Mindy Kaling at the latter’s Los Angeles home has gone viral ever since it was released on social media. The nine-minute video is titled “Mindy

and Kamala make Masala Dosa” and has received widespread acclaim from

the Indian-American community. Kaling, born Vera Mindy Chokalin-gam, has been a longtime supporter of Harris, who is of mixed Indian and American heritage with her mother hailing from Chennai.

NEW DELHI: Hallmarking of gold jewellery and artefacts will be made mandatory across the country from Jan 15, 2021 to ensure purity of the precious metal, Consum-er Affairs Minister Ram Vilas Paswan has announced.

A notification in this re-gard will be issued on Jan 15 next year and the decision will come into effect after a year, making it compulsory for all the jewellers to regis-ter with the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) and sell only hallmarked gold jewellery and artefacts.

Gold hallmarking is a purity certification of the precious metal and is vol-untary in nature at present. The BIS is already running a hallmarking scheme for gold jewellery since April 2000 and around 40pc of gold jew-ellery is being hallmarked currently. “We are making hallmarking for gold jewel-

Mandatory hallmarking for gold jewellery

lery and artefacts mandatory in the country. We will issue a notification on Jan 15 next year. One-year period will be provided for implementa-tion. From Jan 15, 2021, this will become mandatory,” Paswan told reporters here. One-year deadline

“Jewellers and retailers will be given one year time to exhaust their existing stocks,” he added. Paswan said the decision has been taken to protect consumers interest, mainly in small cities and villages, and ensure that they purchase pure gold jewellery. “We are not touching gold jewellery lying with consum-ers,” the minister clarified. Old jewellery is generally recycled by jewellers.

The BIS has formulated standards for hallmarking gold jewellery in three grades -- 14 carat, 18 carat and 22 carat. Paswan said the government may make it

mandatory for retailers to display prices of these three quality grades at their shops. Asked about the penalty in case of violation, a senior BIS official explained that there is a provision for a fine of a minimum Rs 1 lakh and up to five times of the value of article as well as one year jail under the BIS Act passed last year. At present, there are 877 assaying and hallmark-ing centres in 234 district lo-cations and 26,019 jewellers have taken BIS registration.

“We are targeting to open hallmarking centres in all districts of the country and register all jewellers during this one year window,” he said, adding that a massive awareness campaign would be launched. Paswan said the draft quality control order for mandatory hallmarking of gold jewellery and artefacts has been hosted on WTO website on Oct 10, 2019 for

comments within 60 days. As per global trade rules

of WTO, a member country has to notify a quality con-trol order with the Geneva-based multilateral body and the process takes about two months time. Exporting na-tions have to comply with the BIS quality norms speci-fied for gold in the quality control order. India is a part of the 164-member WTO since 1995. India is the larg-est importer of gold, which mainly caters to the demand of jewellery industry. In volume terms, the country imports 700 to 800 tonne of gold annually.Accord-ing to World Gold Council data, India’s cumulative gold demand declined to 496.11 tonnes during the first nine months of 2019 from 523.9 tonnes in the year-ago pe-riod. The 2018 full year gold demand stood at 760.4 tonnes.

India, Singapore conduct Joint military trainingKALAIKUNDA AIR BASE: The 10th Joint Military Training (JMT) between Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF) and the Indian Air Force (IAF) are being held at Kalaikunda Air Force Station from Oct 31 to Dec 12. For the first time ever, the scope of the exercise was expanded to include an air-sea training component, with assets from the Indian Navy supporting. This is to commemorate the 10th edi-tion of the JMT.

“Since the conduct of the first JMT in 2008, the exer-cise has grown in scale and complexity with advanced fighter assets from both countries training together to enhance our interoper-ability,” said Commander of the RSAF’s Air Combat Command Brig-Gen Ho Kum Luen. Highlighting the sig-nificance of this year’s JMT, he added: “The scope of the exercise, which includes both air-to-air and air-to-sur-face scenarios, provides real-istic training and increases

the operational readiness for both air forces.”

Through high-end train-ing such as Air Combat and Mission-Oriented Train-ings, JMT allows aircrew from both air forces to hone their operational skills and enhance interoperability. “JMT provides the IAF and the RSAF, both being profes-sional and capable air forces, with excellent opportuni-ties to train alongside each other,” commented Senior Air Staff Officer of the IAF’s Eastern Air Command Air Marshal VR Chaudhari.

Reaffirming the strong and long-standing defence relations between the two air forces, he added: “This 10th edition of JMT is testament to our strong relationship and the lasting friendship that we have built over the years.” Brigr-Gen Ho said: “The RSAF values the opportunity to train alongside our coun-terparts from India, which enhances our competencies and also builds mutual trust amongst our people.”

Indian student in California shot deadSAN BERNARDINO: Ab-hishek Sudhesh Bhat, who was pursuing his Masters degree in Computer Sci-ence from California State University (CSU) in San Bernardino, was shot dead by an unknown assailant. Bhat (25), originally from Mysore, had been working part time at a hotel nearby and was wrapping up his work when he was killed.

Meanwhile, a report in The Sun says that a 42-year-old San Bernardino man,

identified as Eric Devon Turn-er, was arrested on suspicion

of shooting to death of Bhat. Sgt Albert Tello of the San

Bernandino police told The Sun that suspect had fled on foot, but was identified by po-lice and later turned himself in. Why he shot Bhat was not immediately known. He had completed a Bachelor of Engi-neering in Computer Science from Vidya Vikas Institute of Engineering and Technology in Mysore and had moved to the US around 18 months ago to pursue his masters.

According to his Facebook profile, Bhat was also working as a teaching assistant of Dr Er-

nesto Gomez for the Computer Science Class -- CSE320. He is survived by his parents --- father Sudesh Chand is a yoga instructor at the Upanishat Yoga Centre in Kuvempunagar in Mysore, and his mother Nandini Aithal, a housewife. The family had received a call telling them that there had been a shooting, however no further details were disclosed. A few minutes prior to that, Chand had spoke with his son and also received a WhatsApp message from him.

Sudhesh Bhat

Seagull...(Contd. from page 1)well. It has tapped its pres-ence in Mumbai, New Del-hi, Kochi and Chennai in India and also internation-ally in Nepal, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Seagull has its testing and training centres in Chennai and Kathmandu (Nepal).

Seagull International is led by Dr Sureshkumar Madhusudhanan, Manag-ing Director, who holds a PhD in HR Management and a Master of Business Administration (MBA) in HR. He has been the Man-aging Director of Seagull Group of companies since its incorporation and is a visionary with a career span of more than three decades.

India’s Haj...(Contd. from page 1)for a successful Haj 2019, while adding, “Today on behalf of Indian govern-ment we signed the bilateral agreement with Saudi Ara-bia for Haj 2020.”

Naqvi signed India-Saudi bilateral agreement on Haj-2020, on the India side, while Minister of Haj and Umrah Dr. Mohammad Saleh Bin Tahir Bentan represented the Saudi side. “Haj-2019 operation was very successful and went off smoothly and was incident-free and two lakh Indian Mus-lims performed Haj without subsidy. And we hope that the same number will perform Haj in 2020 with the same ease and comfort,” he said in his introduction. On the most important issue of the Makkah Road Initiative, Naqvi said work is in progress.

“Just after the completion of the Haj 2019, we began prepara-tions in earnest for Haj 2020 so that Indian pilgrims will be safe and secure while performing their pilgrimage,” he added.

GST collectionover Rs 1-lakh-crNEW DELHI: GST collec-tions crossed the Rs 1 lakh crore mark after a gap of three months in Nov, grow-ing by six per cent to Rs 1.03-lakh-crore aided by festival demand.

The GST collection stood at Rs 97,637 crore in the same month last year while revenue collection under this head was Rs 95,380 crore in Oct.

After two months of neg-ative growth, GST revenues witnessed an impressive recovery with a positive growth of six per cent in Nov 2019 over Nov 2018 collections.

According to official sources, the number reflects pick up in consumption and improvement in compli-ance as well. Non-intrusive means of tax collection has helped improved compli-ance, sources said.

Tuesday, December 03, 2019 3GULF JOBS & OPPORTUNITIES

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GULF JOBS & CAREERS 5Tuesday, December 03, 2019

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Your wellness

Young people diag-nosed with Type 2 diabetes experience

high psychological dis-tress, resulting in worse health outcomes and poor blood sugar control, find

researchers from Carnegie Mellon University.

Age plays a critical role in the well-being of people

Diabetes-related stress more harmful for young adults

newly diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes.

“We found we can eval-uate a patient’s initial stress and predict how they will be doing six months later,” said Vicki Helgeson, profes-

sor of psychology at the university.

“If you can identify peo-ple who are facing diabetes

distress earlier, you can intervene and prevent their health from declining,” said the findings published in the Journal of Behavioral Medicine.

In the study, the team evaluated 207 patients who were diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes within the past two years.

They found younger patients (42 years and younger) experienced higher diabetes-related and psychological dis-tress.

In addition, patients with higher education and income expressed more stress.

Conversely, older pa-tients (older than 64

years) had less psycho-logical stress and greater consistency in self-care, blood sugar control and

medication adherence. Patients in long-term

relationships also reported less diabetes stress.

Patients identified diet as the greatest stressor (38 per cent).

Other significant stress-ors include checking blood sugar (8 per cent) and experiencing high or low blood sugar events (7 per cent).

Patients who self-r e p o r t e d g r e a t e r stress also reported greater depressed mood, less ad-herence to medication and higher anxiety.

“Diabetes care is dif-ficult, because it requires a lifestyle change that you have to do forever,” Helgeson said. “Life gets in the way of sticking to a diabetes regimen.”

You know that win-ter has officially arrived when there

are too many red, snif-fling noses in the vicinity. When the weather is tran-sitional, the cold viruses are most active, wait-ing for host bodies. And while there are many ways to combat common cold and flu, nothing works

quite like zinc sup-plements. Find out how you

can stay fit this winter.The discussion around

zinc started way back in 1984, when a study showed that zinc supple-ments kept people from getting as sick. Since then, there have been many researches and studies conducted around the world to understand the

Caught the cold? Zinc supplements to the rescue

connection between zinc and common cold.

Researches conducted in the recent past reveal that by taking zinc within the first 24 hours of the showing of symptoms — in the form of lozenges or syrup — you may be able

to lessen the severity of the cold. They also sug-gested that zinc be used regularly to prevent colds in general.How does it work?

Most common colds are caused by the rhino-virus, which thrives and multiplies in the respira-tory system, mainly in the nasal passages and the throat. With zinc in your body, you may be able to prevent this virus from multiplying. The

zinc may also prevent it from latching on to the mucous membranes. In lozenge and/or syrup form, it is most effective, because it lingers in the throat for long and fights the rhinovirus.Before you consume

The first thing would be to check w i t h y o u r doc to r be -fore you self-m e d i c a t e . Your medical history may determine if zinc is good for you. Al-

ternatively, there are many other things that you can do to get some re-lief: like eat hot soup, use a humidifier, eat healthy, etc.The side effects

Zinc — especially in lozenge form — may have side effects, including bad taste in the mouth, accompanied by nausea. In extreme cases, peo-ple who used zinc nasal sprays even permanently lost their sense of smell.

New Zealand’s Massey U n i v e r s i t y h a s signed an agreement

with the National Insti-tute of Fashion Technology

(NIFT) to collaborate in the area of ‘sustainable fashion’.

The Memorandum of Un-derstanding (MoU), which was signed at the New Zealand High Commission here, is in line with New Zealand’s continued efforts to strengthen its education ties with India.

New Zealand’s varsity signs MoU with NIFTThe MoU between the

College of Creative Arts, Massey University, New Zealand and NIFT in India will be basis for discussions

around staff and student ex-change along with research agendas that hold great potential for collaboration and international research.

“The College of Creative Arts values the Prime Min-ister’s Scholarships for Asia programme and we com-mend the entire team for

facilitating this opportunity for students to collaborate with NIFT to address sus-tainable fashion design, one of the societal challenges of

our age,” Claire Robin-son, Vice-Chancellor, Massey University said.

Both institutions are collaborating as part of a sustainable fashion team project titled “Make Fashion Circular: A New Sus-tainability Paradigm”. Eight students from Massey University par-ticipated with NIFT students to develop

concepts for innovative circular solutions to fashion design and production.

The project and all re-lated visits will also be captured on film by the students of Massey Univer-sity Creative Media Produc-tion to create a sustainable fashion documentary.

The future of learning is going to be multi-disciplinary where

involvement of world-class faculty will ensure better focus and greater intensity of the learning experience, O.P. Jindal Global Univer-sity Vice-Chancellor C Raj Kumar said.

“Retaining high-quality faculty in higher education has been a challenge in India at both undergradu-ate and postgraduate level. Now that universities and policymakers in India are paying closer attention to international rankings, it is time the issue of quality of faculty receive scrutiny by various stakeholders,” Raj Kumar said as he outlined a 10-point growth and reform plan for Indian universities at an event in Bengaluru.

World-class faculty key to quality education in India: JGU VC

“We need to make our universities the catalyst for innovation, economic

growth, social development and entrepreneurship,” he said.

Having a world-class faculty is key to enabling In-dian universities to achieve excellence and also achieve global recognition, accord-ing to the VC.

A World Bank study showed that the knowledge economy today demands a new set of competencies.

Students need interna-tional exposure in their learning process to under-

stand global and lo-cal challenges and to be able to ask ques-tions that matter.

“ Pr i v a t e u n i -versities in India with their new and unique model are poised to be the har-binger of change in

higher education in India,” Raj Kumar said.

Much of the energy sur-rounding the student experi-ence and student learning can be placed on teaching and research - two major responsibilities of faculty.

This is also why regulat-ing the allocation of time to these two roles is one of the most salient issues in universities today. Overall,

effective teachers are the most important factor con-tributing towards student achievement.

Though traditional qual-ity measures such as faculty with doctorate degree and papers published continue to remain important, it is time to look at other param-eters to assess the quality of faculty and their pedagogi-cal rigour and techniques, the VC said.

These new measures in-clude international exposure of faculty (either academic credentials or work experi-ence), quality of journals where research is published, the extent of collaborative work with scholars in other countries, research grants and presentation of research work in leading academic forums internationally.

Obsessing about your weight is redun-dant, since the hu-

man body is unpredictable and the scales keep tipping this way and that, every now and then. And, unless there has been a drastic change of weight, in terms of loss or gain, there really isn’t anything to worry about. If, however, you notice that you have put on a few extra kilos of late, and are wondering how that happened, here are a few possible explanations. Binge eating

You are eating un-healthy, and your diet con-sists mostly of processed foods. Microwave dinners, sugary cereals, junk foods, etc., contain added preser-vatives and other harmful ingredients that can add

to your weight. The key is to consume them on cheat days, or once in a blue moon. If you make binge eating a regular affair, the scales will not show you any mercy. Not to mention, your body will also start showing signs of trouble.

Opt for wholesome, nutri-tious meals.Lazy lifestyle

If you are guilty of following a sedentary lifestyle, be prepared to put on weight. A seden-tary lifestyle is devoid of physical activities. Most

people with desk jobs, return home to their mo-bile phones and television sets, without squeezing in any time for exercising. It can lead to a host of other problems, besides weight gain.Not sleeping enough

If you are not getting enough sleep, voluntarily or involuntarily, you are putting yourself at the risk of gaining weight. Studies have shown that insuf-ficient sleep is linked to weight issues and other health problems. Clocking in enough hours can allevi-ate this problem. If you are having trouble sleeping, there are many things you can do to remedy this.Being stressed

When you are stressed, the stress hormone cortisol

shoots up. It is known to increase hunger, par-ticularly the urge to eat high-calorie foods. Besides, many studies conducted in the past have shown that those with weight condi-tions such as obesity, have higher cortisol levels than those who do not.A medical issue

Don’t jump to con-clusions before checking with your doctor. But, sometimes, weight gain is linked to one or more undi-agnosed health conditions. From thyroid issues and depression to polycystic ovary syndrome and binge eating disorder, the rea-son could be anything. If you think you are gaining weight because of medical reasons, check with your doctor immediately.

What can cause weight gain

To help contain the country ’s rising energy import bill

and initiate institutional hand-holding of public sector units (PSUs) by researchers, a Centre of Excellence in oil, gas and energy has been set up at IIT-Bombay (IIT-B). The centre has come up amid talks of foreign in-vestment in the oil and gas sector by Minister of

Centre set up at IIT-Bombay for India’s energy securityPetroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan.

The centre will col-laborate with six PSUs of oil and gas sector — Oil India Ltd, Oil and Natural Gas Corp, Gas Authority of India Ltd, Bharat Pe-troleum Corporation Lim-ited, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited and Indian Oil Corporation — and Engineers India Limited to conduct re-

search projects “from lab to implementation-ready stage in mission mode”. The PSUs will also be re-sponsible for the centre’s funding.

“India’s energy import bill is rising and proving unsustainable. We need to secure energy resources and find more energy resources in India. The centre will deliberate on the implementation idea

of non-conven-tional ideas,” said nuclear physicist Dr Anil Kakod-kar, under whose c h a i r m a n s h i p the first meet-ing of the gov-erning council of the centre was held on Novem-ber 7. Kakodkar was also part of a high-level com-

mittee appointed by the Petroleum Ministry.

The idea to set up the centre was mooted by Pradhan during his visit to IIT-B in December 2017, as per a statement by IIT-B. The Moue was signed earlier this year.

Kakodkar said, “The idea is to try and see if artificial intelligence, dig-ital refineries and other concepts can be applied

to the sector to create leadership in this domain. Energy equivalent for bio-mass is significant. Can we derive a significant part of our energy needs through biomass?… The centre will identify areas and projects based on industry needs. The ad-visory council includes people from industries. We will look at short term problems.”

In Aug 2019, the share of the US visa-related searches from abroad were 75.6pc

more than double its Aug 2017 level of 36.5pc. Over-all, the top 10 countries accounted for nearly 56.5pc of all foreign visa-related searches in 2018.

IN FOCUS6 Tuesday, December 03, 2019

GULF FAQsI have been employed by a trading company in the emirate of Dubai. I and other employ-ees of the firm are often verbally threatened by our employer. He uses expletives and ob-scene terms while shouting at us. We are 12 employees and there is no HR department in our company where we can file a complaint against our employer. Is it legal to record our employer’s verbal abuses electronically and present it to a court or police?

Your employer should not verbally abuse you and your colleagues in the workplace as abusing any individual in the UAE is a criminal offence. This is in accordance with Article 374 of the Federal Law No. 3 of 1987 in issuance of Penal Code of UAE (the “Penal Code”), which states: “Punishment by detention for a period not exceeding six months or by a fine not exceeding Dh5,000 shall apply if slander or abuse is transmitted by telephone or face to face with the victim and in the presence of a third party.”

Based on the aforementioned provision of law and Article 10 (4) of the Federal Law No. 35 of 1992 related to Criminal Procedure Law, a criminal action may be lodged upon a writ-ten or verbal complaint of the victim or their legal representative with the police against the perpetrator of an offence related to insult and slander. Your complaint may be supported by the statements of your colleagues as witnesses.

On the other hand, you and your col-leagues may file a written complaint with the employer. A copy of the said letter may be addressed to the Ministry of HR and Emir-atisation (the MOHRE). This is in accordance with Article 155 of the Federal Law No. 8 of 1980 regulating employment relations in the UAE (the “Employment Law”), which states: “If a dispute arises between an employer(s) and all or part of his/their employees and both parties fail to reach an amicable settle-ment, the following steps shall be taken:

1) The employees shall submit their complaint in writing to the employer and simultaneously dispatch a copy thereof to the MOHRE.

2) The employer shall reply in writing to the complaint or claims of the employees within seven working days from the date of receipt of the complaint. A simultane-ous copy thereof shall be submitted to the MOHRE at the same time.

3) If the employer fails to submit his reply to the complaint within the fixed period or if his reply does not result in settlement of the dispute, the competent MOHRE of its own motion or at a request of either party shall mediate to settle the dispute amicably.

4) If the complaint is made by the employer, he must submit it directly to the MOHRE to me-diate for an amicable settlement of the dispute.”

In response to the last part of your query it may be pertinent to note that the electronic voice recording of an individual should not be made without the consent of the person being recorded. This is in accordance with Article 378 of the Penal Code, which states: “A punishment of confinement and fine shall be inflicted on any person who attacks the sanctity of individuals’ private or family life by committing any of the following acts in other than the legally permitted cases or without the victim’s consent:

a: Eavesdropping or recording or trans-mitting by any system of whatever kind, any conversation held at a particular place or via the phone or any other set.

b: Picking up or transmitting by any sys-tem of whatever kind, a person’s picture at a particular place. If the acts referred to in the above two cases during a meeting within the hearing or sight of the person attending, their consent shall be required.

The same punishment shall be inflicted on any person who publishes through any means --- news, pictures or comments per-taining to the secrets of people’s private or familial lives even if the same is true. A punishment of confinement for a period not exceeding seven years and a fine shall be inflicted on any public officer who com-mits any of the acts described in this article depending on his functionary authority.

In all cases, systems and other tools used in the crime shall be confiscated and the recordings found shall be obliterated or destroyed.” It may, therefore, be prudent on your part as an employee to file a complaint with the MOHRE. This is in accordance with Article 136 of the Employment Law, which states: “The employment department shall not in application of the provisions of the law and the rules and orders issued in implementation thereof, whenever possible, initiate criminal proceedings before giving advice and guidance to employers and em-ployee who commit violations against the law and, when necessary, gives them written warning to rectify their situation so as to be in accordance with the law, before initiating

How to deal with foul-mouthed boss in UAE criminal proceedings.” You may consult a legal practitioner for further advice.Money transfers

I have availed loans in the UAE and intend to repay them by selling off my property in In-dia. Can I transfer the proceeds from the sale of a property in India to the UAE? Are there any restrictions imposed by the government of India on the amount of funds transferred to the UAE? Do I have to take permission from RBI and Central Bank of UAE for the transfer of funds from India to the UAE?

Pursuant to your queries, it is assumed that you are an NRI currently residing in the UAE and the property which you intend to sell is located in India. Therefore, the provi-sions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act of 1999 (FEMA), the regulations of the Foreign Exchange Management (acquisi-tion and transfer of immovable property in India) Regulations of 2000 read with Master Circular No. 4/2013-14 (the “acquisition and transfer regulations”) and the Foreign Exchange Management (remittance of assets) Regulations of 2016 (the “remittance of assets regulations”) issued by RBI are applicable.

As your residency status in India is that of an NRI, it may be noted that you may through your Non-Resident Ordinary (NRO) bank account remit up to $1,000,000 out of India the sale proceeds of the property acquired by way of inheritance/legacy. This is in accordance with Regulation 3.2 (i) of the Remittance of Assets Regulations, which states: “Authorised dealers may allow NRIs/ Person of Indian Origin (PIO), on submis-sion of documentary evidence, to remit up to $1,000,000, per financial year:

(i) out of balances in their NRO accounts/ sale proceeds of assets/ assets acquired in India by way of inheritance/ legacy.

Where the remittance is to be made from the balances held in the NRO account, the authorised dealer should obtain an undertak-ing from the account holder stating that (the said remittance is sought to be made out of the remitter’s balances held in the account arising from his/ her legitimate receivables in India and not by borrowing from any other person or a transfer from any other NRO account and if such is found to be the case, the account hold-er will render himself/ herself liable for penal action under FEMA).” It may, therefore, be noted that the sales proceeds up to $1,000,000 may only be remitted from India if the property was acquired by way of inheritance/legacy.For the property which is acquired by way of purchase, an NRI may repatriate the sale proceeds provided the conditions mentioned under Regulation 5 (A) (b) of the Acquisition and Transfer Regulations are met. The condi-tions being: “(i) the immovable property was acquired by the seller in accordance with the provisions of the foreign exchange law in force at the time of acquisition by him or the provi-sions of these regulations (ii) the amount to be repatriated does not exceed: -the amount paid for acquisition of the immovable property in foreign exchange received through normal banking channels, or the amount paid out of funds held in foreign currency Non-Resident Account or the foreign currency equivalent (as on the date of payment) of the amount paid where such payment was made from the funds held in Non-Resident External account for acquisition of the property and

(iii) in the case of residential property, the repatriation of sale proceeds is restricted to maximum two such properties.”

Further, the prior permission of RBI is necessary for remittance in excess of $1,000,000 per financial year for the proper-ties acquired by inheritance/legacy.

This is in accordance with Regulation 4.1 (a) (ii) of the Remittance of Assets Regula-tions, which states: “Prior approval of RBI is necessary for remittance of assets where: a) Remittance is in excess of $1,000,000 per financial year (ii) by NRIs/ PIOs out of the balances held in NRO accounts/ sale pro-ceeds of assets/ the assets acquired by way of inheritance/ legacy.” However, it may be pertinent to note that if the property was acquired by an NRI by way of purchase and not by way of inheritance/legacy, the NRI or his successor shall not, except with the prior permission of RBI, repatriate outside India the sale proceeds of any immovable property.

This is in accordance with Regulation 5 (A) (a) of the Acquisition and Transfer Regu-lations, which states: “A person referred to in sub-section (5) of Section 6 of the FEMA, or his successor shall not, except with the prior permission of RBI repatriate outside India the sale proceeds of any immovable property referred to in that sub-section.”

No prior permission is required by Cen-tral Bank of UAE to receive funds from India. You may consult a chartered accountant or a legal practitioner and the bank with which you hold an NRO account in India.

President Ram Nath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi with President of Sri Lanka Gotabaya Rajapaksa at the Ceremonial Reception, at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi.

Maharashtra to reserve 80pcprivate sector jobs for localsMUMBAI: Maharashtra Gov-ernor B S Koshyari has said the Shiv Sena-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government is concerned over unemploy-ment and it would enact a law to ensure 80pc reserva-tion in private sector jobs for the “sons of the soil”. Koshy-ari made the announcement while addressing the joint sitting of the state legislature at Vidhan Bhawan in which he laid out the new govern-ment’s broader agenda for the coming years.

He said the government would provide meal at Rs 10 to common citizens and build a super-speciality hos-pital in every district of the state. Providing statutory 80pc reservation in jobs for the local youth, Rs 10 meal and building super-spe-ciality hospitals were part

of the common minimum programme finalised by the ruling Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress combine.

“The Sena-NCP-Congress combine’s Maha Vikas Agha-di government is concerned over unemployment. The new government will en-act a law to ensure 80pc reservation in private sec-tor jobs for the sons of the soil,” Koshyari said in a speech which he made in Marathi. He further said the government will soon present a “true picture” of the economic status of Maharashtra. “That picture will broadly talk about the economic status of the state and its financial condition,” he said.“The government will set up centres to pro-vide meal at Rs 10 in the state. Clinics will be set up

where health screening will be done at the cost of Re 1. Super-speciality hospitals will be constructed in every district,” he said. The gov-ernor also said appropriate measures would be taken to bail out farmers whose Kharif crop got damaged in unseasonal rains in Nov. “Farmers from 349 tehsils in 34 districts of Maharashtra suffered crop loss due to untimely showers. Appro-priate measures would be taken to ease their woes. This government will also work for providing appropri-ate remuneration to farmers’ for their produce,” he said.

Koshyari also said the government would try to of-fer education to women free of cost and build hostels for working women. “A progres-sive society offers opportu-

nity for the people. We will try to offer higher education for women for free. This government will also try to provide hostels for working women at all the district places,” he added. Koshyari said the new government will form a policy to at-tract more IT firms to make investment in the state. “To attract more investment in other industrial sectors, we will offer more facilities and better clearance services,” he said, adding that the government will continue its efforts to efficiently enforce plastic ban across the state. “This government would try to address the pending issues of OBCs and other communities. The issues of Anganwadi and Asha workers will be addressed amicably,” he added.

Indian origin woman from Italy fi ndsher biological mom in Kerala

Navya Sofia Dorigatti and family

KOZHIKODE: There are lot of movies based on real-life incidents. But here you have a story that brings back the plot and images of a Malayalam flick. So strong is the similarity between Navya Sofia Dorigatti’s touching tale and Sathyan Anthikad’s” Oru Indian Pranayakatha”, which was released in 2013.

“Oru Indian Pranayakatha” tells the story of Irene Gardner, a Malayali girl with Canadian citi-zenship who comes to the state in search of her biological parents. And here, the persistent efforts of Navya, an Italian girl of Malayali origin who had first reached the state a decade ago in search of her biological parents, yielded result as she could trace her mother. However, in an anti-climax, the mother, who is presently settled in Wayanad with her husband and two children, refused to accept her as she does not want to put her family in a spot.

Navya said: “During one of my visits to Kerala, Rijesh, a police

officer from Kozhikode city, collected all the details from me and promised to help me find my mom. A few

weeks ago, he video-called me and to my surprise, my mother was on the other side.”

“It was indeed a moment that brought tears in my eyes and smiles on my face. I could see the same at the other end,” said Navya. She’s very beautiful and I’ve got lots of features

of her,” said Navya. And she does not want to disturb her mother’s family. “This (acknowledgement from the mother) is what I wanted and so I’m ready to keep this as a secret forever. I never want her family life to suffer because of my entry. My love for her is uncon-ditional.

All I know is that my father is a Hindu and my mother a Chris-tian and it was their religions that separated them and separated me from them,” Navya added. “In the video call, my mother also talked to my husband and two kids. She was very happy seeing her grandchil-dren. She was not ready to disclose the details about my father and I respect her decision. I’ll continue my search for him, who too is also somewhere around,” she said.

“One thing I don’t understand about India is the hue and cry the people here make about love and relationships. My adopted parents taught me that religion or caste has nothing to do with love. I hope India too would change one day,” she said.

MUMBAI: India accounted for 22pc of all visa-related searches to the US from abroad in 2018, according to a survey. This is not surpris-ing given that nearly 62.7pc of initial H-1B approvals in the fiscal year 2017, were for Indian nationals, accord-ing to a report by job site Indeed. The report is based on data on job searches on Indeed platform in 2018. The number of visa-related searches from outside the US peaked in Nov 2018.

Indians made 22pc of all visa searches to US in 2018“In 2018, job searches

from India to the US that contained visa-related terms like H-1B visa or work visa surged. When broken out by region we see that, for 2018, the Maharashtra region ac-counted for 11.3pc of all visa- related job searches from India to the US,” Indeed Hiring Lab chief economist Jed Kolko said. This was followed by the Delhi region at 9.6pc and Gujarat at 8.5pc.

“When looking at changes

between the first-half of 2018 against the latter, the share of visa-related searches from the Tamil Nadu region in-creased the most (up 3.1pc), followed by Gujarat and Pun-jab,” Kolko added. H-1B visa denials are at a record level, while quotas for H-2B visas have been raised, according to the report. Both visa types allow the US employers to temporarily employ foreign workers H-1B for speciality occupations and H-2B for seasonal work.

CORPORATE NEWS 7Tuesday, December 03, 2019

Government will un-veil a series of in-frastructure projects

this month as part of a plan to invest Rs 100 lakh crore ($ 1.39 trillion) in the sector over the next five years, the fi-nance minister said, in a push to improve the coun-try’s economy.

Finance Minis-ter Nirmala Sithar-aman’s comments, as cited in local newspapers, fol-lowed the recently released data, that showed economic growth slowed to 4.5pc in the July-Septem-ber quarter - its weakest pace since 2013 - upping the pressure on Prime Min-ister Narendra Modi’s gov-ernment to speed reforms.

Govt to invest Rs 100 lakh-cr in new infra projects

“A set of officers are looking into the pipeline of projects that can be readied so that once the fund is ready, it could be front-loaded on these projects,” Sitharaman said at a busi-

ness summit in Mumbai, the newspapers reported.

“That task is nearly completed. Before Decem-ber 15, we will be able to announce frontloading of at least ten projects,” she said.

PM Modi came to power in 2014 on the promise to improve economy and boost foreign investments, but he has struggled to meet those aims due to a lack of structural reforms.

P M M o d i won a second term in May and has taken vari-ous measures since 2014 to spur growth, in-cluding cutting the corporate tax and speed-ing up privatisa-

tion of state-run firms.But several economic

indicators show domes-tic consumption is weak, and many economists ex-pect the current slowdown could persist for another two years.

FMCG major Procter & Gamble (P&G) In-dia has set up a Rs

200-crore fund that would partner and invest in com-panies that provides en-vironment sustainability solution. The company will invest in start-ups or com-panies whose sustainable business solutions, span-ning logistics, packaging, supply chain among other solutions can benefit its consumer goods business.

P&G, which announced a similar fund last year, said that the new fund is in line with its global sus-tainability goals ‘Ambition 2030’. The company has already invested more than Rs 200 crore in collaborat-ing with organisations of-fering innovative solutions.

“We know that solv-ing the biggest challenges requires collaboration that

P&G India sets up Rs 200cr fundenables people, planet and businesses to thrive. We are delighted to set-up the environmental sustain-ability fund to collaborate with external partners in India, that are offering cutting-edge en-vironmentally sustainable so-lutions in line with our strat-egy,” said Mad-husudan Gopa-lan, managing director and chief executive officer, P&G In-dian Subconti-nent.

The FMCG major said that over the last one year it has received more than 1,000 applica-tions from start-ups, small businesses, university in-cubation centres and large organisations. P&G also

announced launching its second edition of ‘P&G vGROW External Business Partner Summit’.

The two-day summit, which ended on November 29 offers platform to poten-

tial partners like start-ups, small businesses, indi-viduals and large organisa-tions offering innovative industry-leading solutions to pitch to P&G’s leader-ship team. “This year, the

summit is focused on iden-tifying and implementing step-changing environmen-tally sustainable solutions like packaging innovations, renewable sources of en-ergy and reducing carbon

footprint,” the com-pany said.

M e a n w h i l e , P&G is not the only FMCG com-pany which has been collaborating with new age busi-nesses to promote eco-friendly mea-sures and finding improved solution across value chain. Recently rival firm

Unilever, through Unile-ver Ventures, has made several investment start-ups in the country across categories such as beauty, wellness, data analytics and grocery.

Bhart i A i r te l i s planning to raise about $3 billion (Rs

21,000cr) through various modes, main-ly to pay Ad-justed Gross R e v e n u e (AGR) charg-es, for which the operator has convened a board meet-ing.

The board will evaluate all modes of fund raising such as issuance of eq-uity shares, bonds in-cluding foreign currency convertible bonds, eq-uity-based instruments, qualified institutions placement or rights issue

Bharti Airtel seeks to raise $3b to fund AGR dues

or a combination of these, said Bharti Airtel in a stock exchange filing.

For the second quar-

ter ended September 30, Bharti Airtel had posted a net loss of Rs 23,045 crore, its highest-ever net loss, mainly on account of provisioning for AGR pay-outs. Rival Vodafone Idea

also recorded a loss of Rs 50,921 crore, the highest-ever loss for a corporate in India, during the same

quarter.Airtel has

provided for an additional charge total-ling Rs 28,450 c r o r e . T h e same for Vo-dafone Idea stood at Rs 25,677.9 crore.

The opera-tors – Airtel, Vodafone Idea

and Reliance Jio Info-comm – have also an-nounced plans to hike tariffs from December, in an attempt to mitigate the “acute financial stress” in the sector.

India has been consistent-ly increasing domestic production of steel and is

a net exporter in the current financial year, Union min-ister Dharmendra Pradhan said. He also said the total number of steel plants in the country stood at 977.

During the Question Hour, he said steel is a deregulated sector where market forces and commer-cial considerations decide construction and location of new steel plants.

He was responding to a query on whether the gov-ernment proposes to set up new set up new steel plants in Haryana. According to him, India has become a net exporter of steel in the current year. “The import of steel has increased margin-ally in the last three years

Walmart India, in partnership with HDFC Bank, has

launched a co-branded credit card exclusively for members of its Best Price Modern Wholesale

“B2B Cash & Carry”

stores, offering “free credit up to 50 days. The card was launched here at Best Price Storeby Krish Iyer, President and CEO, Walmart India and Parag Rao, Country Head, Payments Business and Marketing, HDFC Bank. Si-multaneously, the card was

India net exporter of steel this year: Pradhan

Co-branded credit card from Walmart India-HDFC Bank

from 7.23 million tonnes in 2016-17 to 7.83 million tonnes in 2018-19,” he said.

Noting that domestic production has consistently increased regardless of such imports, Pradhan said in the current year, the country is a net exporter. “To counter import of cheap steel, anti-dumping duties have been imposed on various grades of steel which were dumped into the country.

“Import of steel grades which are not manufactured in adequate quantity in the country is essential for supporting manufacturing sector,” he noted. Respond-ing to supplementaries, the minister said there is plan to set up a greenfield steel plant by RINL in Visakhapatnam with an international player.

launched at 26 other Best Price Modern Wholesale Store locations across the country.

“I think, for our mem-bers, it is absolutely momen-tous occasion because this is the first time, our members

in the kirana segment, in the offices and in-stitutions seg-ments and all our small re-sellers will be able to avail credit through digital and for

a period ranging between 18 and 50 days and this credit is free...,” Iyer said.

Walmart would continue to open more stores in the country, he said. It would soon open a store at Kur-nool in Andhra Pradesh, he added.

The country’s manu-facturing sector ac-tivity inched up in

November, but the up-turn remained subdued as growth rates for new orders as well as production were modest, a monthly survey said.

The IHS Markit India Manufacturing PMI rose to 51.2 in November from 50.6 in October, when it had fallen to a two-year low, indicating only a slight improvement in the health of the sector.

Although business con-ditions in the Indian manu-facturing sector improved in November, the rise, however, remained sub-

India’s mfg sector activity growth inches up in Novdued compared to earlier this year and the survey history, the study said.

This is the 28th con-secutive month that the manufacturing PMI has re-mained above the 50-point mark. In PMI parlance, a print above 50 means expansion, while a score below that denotes con-traction.

“After pulling back no-ticeably in October, manu-facturing sector growth displayed a welcoming acceleration in November. Still, rates of expansion in factory orders, production and exports remained far away from those recorded at the start of 2019, with

subdued underlying de-mand largely blamed for this,” said Pollyanna de Lima, Principal Economist

at IHS Markit.According to the survey,

growth of manufacturing

activity in November was supported by the launch of new products and better demand, though restrained

by competitive pressures and unstable market con-ditions.

“Some level of uncer-tainty regarding the econ-omy was evident by a subdued degree of business optimism. Also, companies shed jobs for the first time in over a year-and a-half and there was another round of reduction in input buying,” Lima said.

Lima further noted that the weakness of these forward-looking indicators suggest that firms are brac-ing themselves for chal-lenging times ahead.

On the inflation front, there were only marginal increases in both input costs and output charges in November.

“PMI data continued to

show a lack of inflation-ary pressures in the sec-tor which, combined with slow economic growth, suggests that the RBI will likely extend its accom-modative policy stance and further reduce the bench-mark interest rate during December,” Lima said.

The Reserve Bank may cut interest rates for the sixth straight time on De-cember 5 to support growth that has continued to slip to more than six-year low on slump in manufactur-ing, bankers and experts said.

The RBI has cut interest rates on every single occa-sion the monetary policy

committee (MPC) has met since Shaktikanta Das took over as the Governor in last December.

In five reductions so far in 2019, interest rates have been lowered by a total of 135 basis points over concerns that growth mo-mentum is slowing down and also to try to boost liquidity in the financial system.

GDP growth slowed sharply to a pace of 4.5pc in the July-September, hit by a slump in manufactur-ing output. The pace of GDP growth has moder-ated from the 5pc rate in April-June and 7pc in July-September quarter of 2018.

Hyundai Motor India is all set to ramp up exports of its

popular Sports Utility Ve-hicle (SUV): the Venue. The

Indian unit of the South Korean automobile giant announced that it will be-gin shipping out a substan-

Hyundai set to export Venue SUV to Latin America, Africatial number of Venues to new overseas markets from December: Latin America, Africa and the Gulf. “Hyun-dai Venue is ready to make

its foray in the S o u t h African market f r o m Decem-b e r 2 , 2 0 1 9 , with the first ma-

jor shipment of 1,400 units going to South Africa from the Chennai port on Sat-urday,” said the company.

So far, the auto-major has been shipping out the model to four overseas mar-kets: Nepal, Bhutan, Mauri-tius and the Seychelles. As of the end of October, 1,589 units of the Venue had been exported to these markets.

The decision to increase the overseas market reach of the new SUV, which was launched in May this year, follows the relative suc-cess the model has had in India: a market where the automobile sector has been facing the worst demand downturn in nearly two decades. “Launched in May 2019, Venue has penned

a new success story, hav-ing registered over 90,000 bookings (May-November, 2019) in India,” said S S Kim, MD and CEO, Hyun-dai Motor India Ltd, add-ing “Hyundai promises to continue this momentum in the Year 2020 with new products coupled with new technology”.

While the Venue’s 1.0 Turbo GDi version with a Right Hand Drive system is being exported to all countries currently, includ-ing South Africa, a left hand drive (LHD) version of Venue is under develop-ment. “(This) is planned to

be exported to the Gulf, Africa and Latin America,” the company said.

The prolonged demand slowdown in the domestic automobile segment has seen Indian automakers shift focus to export mar-kets, which have been seeing demand increase steadily. Sales data for the first half of the cur-rent financial year shows that Hyundai has outraced FY19’s top exporter Ford India and has taken pole position, shipping a total of 103,300 units between April and September this year.

Chip maker Intel Corp has opened a 3-lakh sq ft design and innovation centre in Hyderabad that will focus on graphics, hardware plat-

forms and System on Chip (SoC). It will also have an incubation centre, where the company wants to build ‘unicorns’.

The facility can house 1,500 engineers.Addressing a gathering in Hyderabad after the

inaugural, Raja Koduri, Senior Vice-President, Chief Architect and General Manager of Architecture (Graphics and Software) at Intel, said that there was a need to analyse the data in real time. “The amount of data we are generating is way higher than our ability to analyse it. We need to analyse it in real time,” he said.

Early this year, it acquired human resource and ‘knowledge’ of Hyderabad-based startup Ineda Systems.

Intel Corp opens design centre in Hyderabad

8 Travel / Entertainment Tuesday, December 03, 2019

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Emirates’ historic Tolerance Flight takes off: Over 500 passengers from 150-plus nationalities came on board the special Tolerance Flight -- Emirates’ EK 2019 . The flight marks the 48th UAE national day and the UAE Year of Tolerance.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE have signed a raft of agreements which

included a deal to issue joint visit visas for residents of both countries in a bid to boost tourism.

The accord, among six initiatives highlighted dur-ing Crown Prince Moham-med bin Salman’s visit to the UAE, was part of a co-operation deal between the Saudi Commission for Tourism and National Heri-tage (SCTH) and the UAE’s ministry of economy. The agreement will allow for the speeding up of the flow of traffic at ports of entry between the two countries. A separate joint strategy for food security was also inked, aimed at tackling food challenges not only in

Saudi, UAE pact on joint visit visas to boost tourismSaudi Arabia and the UAE but throughout the region.

Enhancing cybersecurity and supporting the provi-sion of reliable cyberspace

for each country was an-other initiative agreed upon to find ways of preventing cyberattacks on the two na-tions. On an economic level, it was agreed to issue an ex-perimental digital currency strictly targeted for banks, with the aim of better under-standing the implications of block-chain technology and facilitating cross-border pay-ments. The two countries

will also develop a new mega-crude refinery with a capacity of 1.2 million bar-rels per day, integrated with a modern petrochemical complex at an initial cost of $70 billion (SR262 billion) in Maharashtra to secure the supply of at least six lakh per day of Saudi crude oil.

A Saudi-Emirati Youth Council is also to be estab-lished to strengthen the partnership between youth in both countries, exchange ideas, and co-ordinate ef-forts to promote young tal-ent. Meanwhile, the two sides also signed four new memoranda of understand-ing (MoUs) in the health, culture, space and food se-curity fields.

The f i r s t MoU was penned between the Saudi

Ministry of Health and its UAE counterpart, and was followed by a cultural agree-ment signed between Noura bint Mohammed Al-Kaabi, the UAE’s minister of culture and knowledge development, and Prince Badr bin Abdul-lah bin Farhan Al-Saud, the Saudi minister of culture.

A third MoU was inked in the field of space between Dr. Ahmad bin Abdullah Hu-maid Belhoul Al-Falasi, min-ister of state for higher educa-tion and advanced skills and chairman of the UAE Space Agency, and Mohammed Al-Tuwaijri, Saudi minister of economy and planning. The fourth accord on food security was agreed between Mariam Hareb Al-Mheiri, minister of state for food se-curity, and Al-Tuwaijri.

Hotels in the Mid-East reported mixed performance results,

while hotels in Africa post-ed mostly positive results across the three key perfor-mance metrics in October, according to data from STR.

Hotels in the MidEast recorded a 6.5pc upswing in occupancy to 67.6pc in Oct while clocking an average daily rate (ADR) of $143.62, down by 3.9pc . Hotels in the region record-ed 2.3pc surge in revenue per available room (RevPAR) to $97.07.

Hotels in Jeddah re-corded 23.9pc rise in oc-cupancy to 48.1pc while posting an ADR surge of 14.9pc to SAR778.34 and RevPAR growth of 42.4pc to SAR374.69. While the mar-ket registered a double-digit increase in occupancy, the

UAE leads MidEast’s hotel occupancyabsolute level in the metric was the second-lowest for an Oct since 2001. STR analysts noted the market’s substan-tial increase in demand (up 30.2pc). Helping that growth was the opening of King Abdul Aziz International Airport’s Terminal-1 and an increase in the number of international flights in the market. An industry report by Alpen Capital in June had predicted that the GCC hos-pitality market was on track to reach $32.5 billion by 2022, thanks to Expo 2020 and other global events that will be hosted in the region over the next few years.Expo visitors

The Hotels Market Report by Ventures Onsite expects 25 million visitors to come to the UAE for Expo 2020 in preparation for which “Dubai’s hotel room supply

is expected to reach 132,000 in 2019, with Dubai aiming to complete 1.6 lakh hotel rooms by Oct 2020”. The re-port said that the UAE would continue to lead the GCC’s luxury hospitality segment till 2022 with “73pc of exist-ing luxury hotel stock and 61pc of the region’s pipe-line located in the country”. During this time period, the report also anticipates that “ Saudi Arabia will witness the most significant increase in luxury hotel supply.

Driven by projects in Dubai, the UAE accounts for 45pc of the GCC region’s current hotel development pipeline, according to indus-try analyst ProTenders. The percentage figure equates to 652 projects worth a com-bined value of $107.8 billion currently planned, on hold or underway in the UAE.

Of this figure, $41.6 billion-worth of hotel projects are currently under construc-tion in the Emirates.

According to ProTenders, Dubai is the UAE’s largest hotel market, with 721 ho-tels and hotel-apartments currently operating in the emirate, boasting a com-bined guestroom inven-tory of 118,382, while Abu Dhabi is home to 168 hotels and a combined inventory of 33,000 guestrooms. Ac-cording to Dubai Tourism, Dubai’s hotel room inven-tory will reach 1.32 lakh by the end of 2019, up from 107,000 at the end of 2017. The increase in capacity will accommodate Dubai Tour-ism’s forecast -- based on 2018 trends- - that occupied room nights in the city will reach 35.5 million by the end of 2019.

The travel and tourism industry in Oman has grown multifold as

the national diversification strategy of the last two de-cades has started showing results. In light of the new focus, the number of tourists coming to the sultanate in-creased from 1.3 million in 2009 to 3.1 million in 2018, an increase of over 200pc.

The numbers were re-vealed during the World Travel Awards, which were held for the first time in Oman at the Royal Opera House, attended by 600 representatives from global airlines and hospitality sec-tors, including 300 foreign delegates, many of them visiting the country for the first time. The number of ho-tels in Oman increased from

Oman registers 200pc increase in tourist arrivals

224 in 2009 to 412 in 2018, offering nearly 22,000 hotel rooms to date. The passenger volumes through airports in Oman increased from 6.2 million in 2009 to 17.2 mil-lion in 2018, with 32 airlines flying to 77 destinations.

All airports in Oman would have catered to around 18 million passen-gers by the year-end, said Sheikh Aimen bin Ahmed al Hosni, CEO, Oman Air-ports told a TV channel. Ac-cording to Graham Cooke, founder and president of World Travel Awards, “We choose Oman as it is the emerging destination with amazing infrastructure.”

The companies from Oman bagged 16 prizes out of 144 which were distribut-ed to more than 180 partici-

pating countries. The Sul-tanate also won an interna-tional award for the World’s Leading Nature Destination, which enhances its presence on the list of the preferred tourist destinations for 2020. Cooke added: “After seeing various Omani companies win so many awards, I am confident that the Sultanate is leading the way towards enhancing the performance of its travel and tourism sec-tors, to become one of the most important sources of its economic income. “The national airline Oman Air bagged four awards – world’s leading airline (First Class), the world’s leading airline to the MidEast, World’s leading airport Lounge and World’s Leading Airline Rewards Programme.

In line with the govern-ment’s aggressive disin-vestment policy, Airports

Authority of India (AAI) has sent a proposal to pri-vatise six more tier-two city airports, including that of Amritsar. Sharing details on the recommendation made by AAI, officials in the gov-ernment said these included airports at Amritsar, Vara-

Switzerland’s Zurich Airport International AG has emerged as the

highest bidder for the pro-posed international airport at Jewar, UP, on the outskirts of Delhi, sparking hopes for the long-delayed project and the development of the area around it.

The first phase of the project is due to be opera-tional by 2023, when it will handle 12 million passen-gers per year, said an official of Noida International Air-port Ltd (NIAL). Zurich Air-port pipped the other three bidders—the GMR Group-led consortium comprising Delhi International Airport Ltd (DIAL), besides Adani Enterprises and Anchorage Infrastructure Investments Holdings by offering the highest bid, according to a NIAL official.

While Zurich Airport offered revenue share of Rs 400.97 per passenger, GMR Group-led DIAL, which had the right of first refusal, of-fered Rs 351. Adani Group

Zurich Airport wins bid for Jewar airport

and Anchorage’s bids stood at Rs 360 and Rs 205 per passenger, respectively.The final tender still needs to be awarded by the airport’s project monitoring and im-plementation committee , but this is likely to be a mere

formality, said a NIAL offi-cial, requesting anonymity. Zurich Airport said it will design, develop and operate the new greenfield airport in Jewar under a 40-year concession.

It will invest 650 million Swiss francs ( Rs 4,663.731cr for the first phase, which will take four years to be completed. The Jewar air-port will be the National Capital Region’s third, after

the Indira Gandhi Interna-tional Airport (IGIA) and Ghaziabad’s Hindon. The new airport will be 100km from the GMR Group-op-erated Delhi airport, the capital’s only international airport so far.

The second phase of the Jewar airport is due to be com-pleted by FY31 and wi l l in -crease its capac-ity to 30 million passengers per year, while the third and fourth

phases are due to be finished by FY36 and FY40, respec-tively, further enhancing its capacity to 50 million and 70 million passengers, respec-tively. “After the successful sale of its remaining shares in the airport in Bengaluru in 2017, Flughafen Zurich AG is excited to be again present in India, a focus market for the company,” the company said, using its Swiss name.

Vistara to add more aircraft, new routes

Soon to complete five years of operations, Tata Group-Singapore

Airlines backed passenger carrier -- Vistara -- plans to operate beyond the sub-continent and southeast Asia. The airline which commenced commercial operations on Jan 9, 2015, has indicated plans to com-mence services to Europe and Japan by 2020-21.

Vistara’s Chief Executive Leslie Thng said India’s only full-service private carrier will be able to add destina-tions with up to 11 hours of flying time as it inducts the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft by early next year. “The 787-9 aircraft that we induct early next year will be able to fly to destinations with up to 11 hours of flying time,” he said. “The choice of our existing codeshare partners may be indicative of the long-haul destinations that we are looking to add to our network.”

The full-service carrier has established interline agreements with 26 airlines around the world and en-tered codeshare agreements with Singapore Airlines, SilkAir, British Airways, Japan Airlines and United Airlines. At present, the airline operates to Singa-pore, Dubai, Bangkok and Colombo. It is said to soon commence operations to Kathmandu.

Late last month, Vis-tara a joint venture of Tata Sons and Singapore Airlines commenced services to Co-lombo from Mumbai. It had inaugurated international

operations in Aug 2019 with Singapore as its first destination, followed by Dubai and Bangkok. Lately, the airline has expanded its fleet and network by close to 50pc. Besides, the num-ber of aircraft deployed by the airline is set to almost double by the end of the current financial year in comparison to the fleet size it had at the start of FY19-20. “We will continue to take delivery of 320s and expect to have 42 aircraft by end March 2020 including 787 and 321,” he said.

“We have planned to use the new aircraft to fur-ther densify our domestic network and to expand our international operations.”

Last year, it placed an order for 50 aircraft from the Airbus A320neo family for the domestic market as well as short and medium-haul

international operations, with deliveries scheduled between 2019 and 2023. Additionally, the airline has purchased six Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft that are scheduled to be delivered between 2020 and 2021, and will be used for long-haul international

operations. Presently, the airline

connects 34 destinations, operates nearly 200 flights a day served by a fleet of 27 Airbus A320 and nine Boeing 737-800NG aircraft. It has flown more than 18 million customers since starting operations.

More airports to be privatisednasi, Bhubaneswar, Indore, Raipur and Trichy.

In February, the govern-ment had privatised airports at Lucknow, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Mangaluru, Thiruva-nanthapuram and Guwahati for operation, management and development through public-private partnership (PPP) model.

“As six airports have al-

ready been privatised in Feb , AAI in its board meeting decided to privatise six more airports,” a senior aviation sector official said. Since the AAI board has already taken the decision, a recommenda-tion in this regard (privatis-ing six airports) has been sent to the ministry of civil aviation, which will take the final call, the officials said.

A Saudi-Emirati Youth Coun-cil is also to be established to strengthen the partnership between youth in both countries, exchange ideas, and co-ordinate eff orts to promote young talent.