The Department of Telecom (DoT) has given final approval to the merger of Vodafone India and Idea Cellular, news agency Press Trust of India (PTI) reported, citing government sources. The nod for Vodafone Idea came days after Idea Cellular and Vodafone India jointly paid Rs. 7,268.78 crore 'under protest' to the DoT. The entities will now approach Registrar of Companies (RoC) for stipulated filings for approval, completing the last leg of formalities, PTI said, citing a senior DoT official. Shares of Idea Cellular closed 4.57 per cent higher at Rs. 57.35 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), whose benchmark index Sensex gained 140 points to end at 36,984.64.

The combination, to be known as Vodafone Idea, will create India's largest mobile-phone company and help the firms compete with billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd., which upended the world's second-largest mobile-phone market by offering free calls and cheap data.

Kumar Mangalam Birla, chairman of Aditya Birla Group, will be the non-executive chairman while Balesh Sharma, currently chief operating officer of Vodafone India, will be the CEO of Vodafone Idea.

The US and India are working together "hand in glove" diplomatically and militarily to build dimensions of the critical bilateral relationship ahead of the "two-plus-two" dialogue, a State Department official has told American lawmakers.

During a Congressional hearing, Alice Wells, principal deputy assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, said the US is looking forward to the "two-plus-two" dialogue with India in New Delhi in September.

She said she expects substantial progress will be made in the bilateral relationship during the dialogue.

On India, we're looking ahead to the September 6th two plus two and the joining of forces between Secretary (of State Mike) Pompeo and (Defence) Secretary (James) Mattis to help define what (is) major defense partnership," Wells said, responding to a question from Indian-American Congressman Ami Bera.

"We're working together hand in glove diplomatically and militarily to build out the dimensions of what Secretary Pompeo said is one of our most critical relationships," she said.

The September meet will be the first "two-plus-two" dialogue between India and the United States. Last month, the US had postponed the dialogue due to "unavoidable reasons".

ISLAMABAD: Official results show cricket star Imran Khan won in Pakistan's polls but he will have to seek out allies to form a coalition government.

After a tediously slow count, Pakistan election officials Friday announced Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party won 109 of the 269 seats being contested in the National Assembly. The election Wednesday gave his nearest rival, Shahbaz Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League 63 seats. Sharif who heads the party of jailed ex-prime minister Nawaz Sharif has rejected the results charging widespread fraud and manipulation.

Khan declared his victory on Thursday and dismissed the allegations of fraud calling it the most transparent election in Pakistan's history.

Third place went to the left of center Pakistan People's party with 39 seats. The Election Commission said vote counting was also still underway in 20 remote areas of the country, offering the long-time politician a possibility of more seats but not an outright majority.

A mix of smaller parties and independent candidates whom Khan will have to woo to form a coalition won the remainder of seats in Pakistan's National Assembly. 

The 6^th India-UK Science & Innovation Council (SIC) meeting held in New Delhi today discussed a range of issues on S&T cooperation between the two countries .Dr. Harsh Vardhan, Minister of Science & Technology, Earth Sciences & Environment, Forests and Climate Change, India and Mr. Sam Gyimah, Minister for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation, UK led the Indian and UK delegations respectively.

Noting the success of the Newton Bhabha partnership through which India and UK are jointly delivering cutting edge science and Technology solutions to societal challenges, Dr. Harsh Vardhan expressed the need to establish few more Network Centres in areas such as Cyber Physical System- Artificial Intelligence, digital Economy, health technologies, cyber security and promoting clean growth, smart urbanization, future mobility and environment.

Dr. Vardhan stressed upon both the countries to expeditiously take forward the UK India tech partnership announced by Prime Ministers Narendra Modi and Theresa May during PM’s Modi’s visit to the UK in April and also welcomed the UK proposal for FutureTech Festival scheduled at New Delhi later this year.

Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) and citizen engagement platform MyGov have launched the online portal ‘Innovate India Platform’.

Through the portal, users can view, comment, share, and rate the innovations crowdsourced on the #InnovateIndia platform, according to an official statement.

They can view the leaderboard which is calculated based on the votes on each innovation. Citizens can also share their or other organisations’ innovation on the platform by logging into the MyGov website. These innovations can also be shared on various social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook, and Twitter.

R Ramanan, Mission Director, AIM under NITI Aayog that promotes innovation, said in the statement that the #InnovateIndia MyGov-AIM portal creates the much-needed innovations platform for registering both grassroots and deep-tech innovators at a national level.

“Those searching for a critical innovation can leverage the portal for the benefit of the economy as well as national social needs,” he added.

MANILA: Two Indians -- one a psychiatrist who works for the mentally-ill street persons and another whose initiative to harness science and culture creatively for economic progress improved the lives of the Ladakhi youth - were today declared the winners of this year's Ramon Magsaysay Award.

Bharat Vaswani and Sonam Wangchuk are among six individuals who were declared winners of the award, regarded as the Asian version of the Nobel Prize.

Vaswani was recognised for "his tremendous courage and healing compassion in embracing India's mentally-afflicted destitute, and his steadfast and magnanimous dedication to the work of restoring and affirming the human dignity of even the most ostracized," the Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation said in its citation for the winner.

Vaswani, who is based in Mumbai, and his wife started an informal operation of bringing mentally-ill street persons to their private clinic for treatment, leading them to establish Shraddha Rehabilitation Foundation in 1988, aimed at rescuing mentally-ill persons living on the streets; providing free shelter, food, and psychiatric treatment; and reuniting them with their families.

Wangchuk, 51, was recognised for "his uniquely systematic, collaborative and community-driven reform of learning systems in remote northern India, thus improving the life opportunities of Ladakhi youth, and his constructive engagement of all sectors in local society to harness science and culture creatively for economic progress, thus setting an example for minority peoples in the world," the citation said.

Wangchuck was a 19-year-old engineering student at the National Institute of Technology in Srinagar when he went into tutoring to finance his schooling and help woefully unprepared students pass the national college matriculation exams.

Bharti Airtel-owned telecom tower company Bharti Infratel Limited said on Monday it has got an approval from the Competition Commission of India to merge with Indus Towers Limited.

Indus Towers is 42 per cent owned by Bharti Infratel and Vodafone each, while Idea Cellular Limited holds 11.15 per cent. The rest is held by private equity firm Providence.

It is the largest tower company in India with around 27 per cent market share.

“Pursuant to Regulation 30 of Sebi Regulations, we are pleased to inform you that the approval of the Competition Commission of India has been received for the proposed merger of Bharti Infratel Limited and Indus Towers Limited,” the company said in a stock filing.

As per the deal, Bharti Infratel will offer 1,565 shares for every one share of Indus Towers.

The 10th BRICS Summit is all set to begin at Johannesburg on 25th July. The Summit will be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, along with other heads of the BRICS Nations, viz Brazil, Russia, China and South Africa.

The summit is being held at a time when the global trade exhibits a war-like scenario. As estimated by the International Monetary Fund, the unilateral trade actions taken by the United States President Donald Trump could cost the world $430 billion by 2020.

BRICS summit this year is expected to witness a lot of actions. It is expected that China will protest the protectionist measures of Donald Trump, as it has suffered the most due to Trump’s actions. India. India will protest against the protectionism, without naming the US.

India shall also raise the issue of setting up a BRICS rating agency, for which it had presented a feasibility study in BRICS Summit 2016. India had argued that the S&P, Fitch and Moody’s methodology is not free from bias.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has called for cumulative co-operation from the BRICS nation in connection with issues like cross-border terrorism, joint action on money laundering, terrorist financing, cyberspace, and deradicalization.

Other issues like Cooperation in the areas of counterterrorism, UN reforms, cybersecurity, energy security and global and regional issues might also be discussed at the BRICS Summit.

NEW DELHI: 

An Indian Air Force contingent landed at the Darwin Air Force Base in Australia on Tuesday to participate in a multinational air exercise, the IAF said in a statement.

The IAF contingent comprised of four Su-30 MKI fighter jets, one C-130 and one C-17 transporter aircraft, it said.

Exercise Pitch Black, a biennial large force employment warfare exercise hosted by the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), involves over 100 aircraft from around the globe and will provide a unique opportunity to the air-warriors to operate in a dynamic warlike environment.

"After the recently-concluded Exercise Gaganshakti-2018, the IAF's engagement with the Indonesian and the Malayasian Air Forces and participation in the Exercise Pitch Black-18 in Australia, the IAF will once again showcase its capability to be an effective net security provider in the region," it said in a statement.

Navigating across the ocean, precise air-to-air engagement with tanker aircraft and ability to operate over the international airspace reaffirms that the Indian Air Force would always play the cutting edge of our nation's military capability, the statement added.

As part of the commonwealth countries, India and Australia have always enjoyed amicable bilateral relations. The air forces of both the countries have participated in the World War II.

Tata AIA Life Monday announced the appointment of Rishi Srivastava as the new Chief Executive Officer & Managing Director starting August 1, 2018, subject to regulatory approval.

Srivastava will take over from current Chief Executive Officer Naveen Tahilyani who takes over as Chief Executive Officer, Group Partnership Distribution, AIA Group, Hong Kong.

Srivastava is currently Chief of Proprietary Channels, Product, Marketing & Corporate Communication at Tata AIA. He has more than twenty years’ experience in finance and insurance. He was previously Chief Agency Officer at ICICI Prudential, before moving to ICICI Bank as General Manager, and then on to AXA as Director of the Agency business in Jakarta.  He joined Tata AIA in 2016.