Will take action against sale of Patanjali Covid-19 drug in Rajasthan: Govt

Neither has anyone applied to the state government nor has the state government given any permission in this regard, State Health Minister Raghu Sharma said.

Amid the ongoing controversy over Yoga guru Baba Ramdev's company Patanjali Ayurveda introducing "cure" for coronavirus infection, Rajasthan government on Wednesday clarified that this drug cannot be not used as a medicine in the state without the permission of the Ministry of AYUSH.

Neither has anyone applied to the state government nor has the state government given any permission in this regard, State Health Minister Raghu Sharma said.

He said according to the gazette notification issued by the Government of India in April this year, under the Drugs and Cosmetic Act 1940 and 1945, no ayurvedic medicine can sold as medicine for corona infection during COVID-19 pandemic without the approval of Union Ministry of AYUSH.

Strict action will be taken against the seller as per the rules in case of sale of any drug as a medicine to treat the coronavirus infection, the minister added.

Patanjali Ayurveda, while presenting ''Coronil'' medicine on Tuesday had claimed that it has found a cure for coronavirus infection.

Sharma said compliance of the guidelines of the Union Ministry of Health, Union Ministry of AYUSH and ICMR is being ensured in the treatment of coronavirus infection in the state.

The health minister said no human clinical test of a drug can be done without the permission of the state government and action will be taken against those who mislead the common people by doing ''clinical trials'' without permission.

Referring to the various guidelines of the central government and other regulatory bodies, Sharma said without their compliance, action will be taken against the publicity and sale of any such means to treat the infection.

Pompeo declares Reliance Jio 'clean' for spurning Huawei telecom gear

Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani had told US President Donald Trump during his February visit to India that Jio was the only network in the world to not have a single Chinese component.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has declared Reliance Jio a "clean" network for not using the Chinese company Huawei's equipment, keeping it safe from Beijing's intelligence intrusions.

Listing Jio among the "world's leading" telecom operators, Pompeo said on Wednesday that it was one of the "Clean Telcos" for spurning Huawei, which he called a part of the "Chinese Communist Party (CCP) infrastructure."

Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani had told US President Donald Trump during his February visit to India that Jio was the only network in the world to not have a single Chinese component.

Jio is reportedly trying the 'swadeshi' route for 5G and has applied to the Department of Telecommunications for permission to carry out lab tests for the technology without third-party participation.

Facebook announced a $5.7 billion investment in Jio in April.

Pompeo said that by Jio along with some other Canadian, British and French telecoms was "disconnecting from the Chinese Communist Party infrastructure" by not using Huawei equipment.

"They are rejecting doing business with tools of the CCP surveillance state, companies like Huawei," he added while speaking to the media before the release of the State Department's annual terrorism report.

The US campaign against the Chinese telecom equipment manufacturer over fears its gear can be used for espionage has intensified as the company begins its push into the next-generation 5G networks.

IMF projects global economy to shrink by 4.9% this year over Covid-19

The International Monetary Fund has sharply lowered its forecast for global growth this year because it envisions far more severe economic damage.

The International Monetary Fund has sharply lowered its forecast for global growth this year because it envisions far more severe economic damage from the coronavirus than it did just two months ago.

The IMF predicts that the global economy will shrink 4.9 per cent this year, significantly worse than the 3 per cent drop it had estimated in its previous report in April. It would be the worst annual contraction since immediately after World War II.

For the United States, the IMF predicts that the nation's gross domestic product the value of all goods and services produced in the United States will plummet 8 per cent this year, even more than its April estimate of a 5.9 per cent drop. This, too, would be the worst such annual decline since the US economy demobilized in the aftermath of World War II.

The IMF issued its bleaker forecasts Wednesday in an update to the World Economic Outlook it released in April.

The update is generally in line with other recent major forecasts. Earlier this month, for example, the World Bank projected that the global economy would shrink 5.2 per cent this year.

The IMF noted that the pandemic was disproportionately hurting low-income households, imperiling the significant progress made in reducing extreme poverty in the world since 1990.

Former Grab employees' start-up Nextbillionai raises $7 mn in funding

Company has launched an AI-driven mapping solution that customises APIs based on the size of the vehicles.

AI-driven solutions start-up Nextbillionai has raised $7 million from Lightspeed Venture Partners and Falcon Edge Capital. The company will use the funds to scale up hiring and launch new AI-enabled products.

The company--founded by former Grab executives Ajay Bulusu, Gaurav Bubna and Shaolin Zheng about three months ago--has launched an AI-driven mapping solution that customises APIs based on the size of the vehicles. The company has got 10 clients in India for its first product from sectors such as logistics, ecommerce, food delivery and freight.

“Globally, Google doesn’t provide any API except four wheeler. When you do that. Our first product Nextbillionmaps provides enterprises with a range of APIs like routing, navigation, direction and distance matrix,” said co-founder Bulusu, who is a former Google executive.

The Nextbillionai team aims to build products with AI as the backbone. For this, the founders have hired engineers from global companies like Alibaba, Tencent, TikTok and Google. The second product that the start-up is working on is a full stack AI labelling platform called Nextbilliontasks. The product decodes data and simplifies multi-lingual texts, image classification, and video annotations. It is also working to roll out products in the facial recognition segment.

“The opportunity in solving hyperlocal challenges is huge, and mapping is just one of them. We at Lightspeed are excited by the prospect of partnering with this team as they build a range of turnkey enterprise solutions around Maps, Facial AI and NLP to address the needs of the next billion consumers both in developing and developed markets,” said Hemant Mohapatra, Partner, Lightspeed Ventures.

Criminalising match-fixing in India will be a game-changer: ICC official

Legal experts have been advocating for years the need to criminalise match-fixing in India, the lack of which has meant that the hands of authorities have been tied.

A senior official of the ICC's anti-corruption unit feels that making match-fixing a criminal offence in India will be the "single-most-effective thing" in a country where the police are "operating with one hand tied behind their back" in the absence of any stringent law.

Legal experts have been advocating for years the need to criminalise match-fixing in India, the lack of which has meant that the hands of authorities have been tied when it comes to investigating corruption in the popular sport.

"At the moment with no legislation in place, we'll have good relations with Indian police, but they are operating with one hand tied behind their back," ICC ACU's coordinator of investigations, Steve Richardson, was quoted as saying by 'ESPNcricinfo'.

He added, "We will do everything we can to disrupt the corruptors. And we do, we make life very, very difficult for them as far and as much as we can to stop them from operating freely.

"But the legislation would be a game-changer in India. We have currently just under 50 investigations. The majority of those have links back to corruptors in India.

"So it would be the single-most-effective thing to happen in terms of protecting sport if India introduces match-fixing legislation."

With India set to host two ICC world events in the next three years, Richardson urged the Indian government to frame a legislation on match-fixing like its neighbour Sri Lanka, which became the first major cricket-playing country in South Asia to criminalise the corrupt practice in 2019.

Working to complete contours of Saudi Aramco deal, says Mukesh Ambani

The deal was to be concluded by March 2020 but has been delayed.

Oil-to-telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) on Tuesday said it is working to complete contours of a USD 15-billion deal with Saudi Aramco but did not give a timeline for its completion.

Richest Indian Mukesh Ambani in August last year announced talks for sale of 20 per cent stake in the oil-to-chemical (O2C) business, which comprises its twin oil refineries at Jamnagar in Gujarat and petrochemical assets, to the world's largest oil exporter. The deal was to be concluded by March 2020 but has been delayed.

"Reliance is working to complete the contours of a strategic partnership with Saudi Aramco," Ambani said in the firm's latest annual report without giving timelines.

The partnership with Aramco would give Jamnagar refineries "access to a wide portfolio of value-accretive crude grades and enhanced feedstock security for a higher oil-to-chemicals conversion," he said.

Reliance executed on the next phase of its growth journey in 2019-20, forging transformative partnerships across businesses.

"Reliance and Aramco share a common outlook and vision on the evolution of the business in the future with emphasis on higher oil-to-chemicals conversion," the firm said in the annual report.

Also, the firm said it has formed a 51:49 joint venture with BP plc of the UK for automobile and aviation fuel business in India.

OnePlus goes back to making affordable smartphones, launch set for July

The upcoming phone will be a part of company's new smartphone series, which will coexist with company's premium smartphone line-up.

OnePlus is set to start making affordable smartphones once again. In recent years, the Chinese smartphone maker gradually shifted base to premium segment, leaving the midrange segment it once made mainstream in price conscious Indian smartphone market open for others. Now, the company is set to make cheaper OnePlus smartphones, which would launch in India and Europe in July. The upcoming phone will be a part of company’s new smartphone series, which will coexist with company’s premium smartphone line-up.

The company has not officially named the series or the first product. It has neither revealed the exact India launch date plans. However, it has started a new Instagram account for the upcoming series with the name OnePlusLiteZThing, which hints at the possible naming nomenclature. While the technology enthusiasts are calling the upcoming phone the OnePlus Z and OnePlus Nord, there is nothing official and we might get to hear about the products soon as the company is also launching in India its affordable OnePlus smart TVs on July 2.

“Never Settle has always been at the core of OnePlus. For more than 6 years, that has meant working hard to always deliver the best experience for flagship smartphone users. However, as we’ve grown together with our community, we know that there are many people who want a really solid smartphone that meets their everyday needs, and for a more accessible price,” said Pete Lau in a blogpost on OnePlus official forum.

He added, “As we have always done when we try something new, we are going to start relatively small with this new product line by first introducing it in Europe and India.”