Parliament on Wednesday passed a bill that seeks to prevent big economic offenders like Vijay Mallya and Nirav Modi from fleeing the country and evading the legal process.

The Fugitive Economic Offenders Bill, 2018 was passed by the Rajya Sabha with a voice vote. The Lok Sabha had cleared the measure on July 19.

Finance Minister Piyush Goyal said instances of people running away and evading legal process was increasing, which needed to be stopped as the current laws do not allow dealing with the "severity of the problem".

"Criminal law does not allow us to impound their property," he added.

The BRICS Summit in Johannesburg, which discussed multilateralism, global governance, health and vaccines, socio-economic empowerment of women, peacekeeping, network of science, parks and technology, inclusive growth, sustainable development and infrastructure (See: Modi calls for technology-led growth for expanded BRICS cooperation). 

On the conclusion of the meeting, the BRICS leaders' issued the following statement:

Collaboration for Inclusive Growth and Shared Prosperity in the 4th Industrial Revolution

the Indian women's compound archery team reached the pinnacle of world rankings for the first time in history, according to the latest rankings, just ahead of the Asian Games.

Asian Games are set to be held from August 18 to September 2 in the twin cities of Jakarta and Palembang in Indonesia.

The women's coumpoud archery team of India had won silver medals at the 2018 Antalya World Cup in May and Berlin World Cup in July, 2018.

Courtesy that effort, they lead the world rankings with 342.6 points and are six points ahead of the second-placed Chinese Taipei.

Jyothi Surekha Vennam and Muskan Kirar were two regulars in the women's team in both the World Cup stages, while Divya Dhayal (Antalya) and Trisha Deb (Berlin) were the third members.

Bengaluru: HCL Technologies Ltd surpassed Wipro Ltd to become India’s third biggest software services provider in the three months to 30 June, marking the first change in the pecking order of the country’s $167 billion IT outsourcing industry in six years.

On Friday, Noida-based HCL Technologies said its dollar revenue rose 0.8% to $2.05 billion in the quarter from the proceeding three months. Bengaluru-based Wipro’s dollar revenue declined 1.7% sequentially to $2.03 billion in the first quarter.

Last year, Wipro’s full-year revenue totalled $8.06 billion, about $220 million more than HCL Technologies’ $7.84 billion. However, billionaire Shiv Nadar-led HCL Technologies expects its dollar revenue to grow by as much as 10.4% in the current fiscal year, implying that it expects to end FY19 with $8.65 billion in revenue.

Azim Premji-led Wipro, which does not give a full-year revenue outlook, will need to grow 7.32% this year to retain its third position, a tough ask as the firm has not reported this level of annual growth since 2012-13, when it grew 7.1%.

Nasdaq-listed Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp., which edged past Infosys Ltd in quarterly revenue in the June quarter of 2012, has not been considered in the list as it is only listed in the US.

BENGALURU: 

Karnataka has overtaken Tamil Nadu to become a leader in renewable energy capacity. This has been highlighted in a new report from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis or IEEFA.

"Karnataka in the last 12 months has become the top state in India in development of renewables; wind and solar both play a major role. Karnataka has reached 46 per cent of total capacity in renewables in the last 12 months. I think it's a huge achievement for the state of Karnataka," Tim Buckley, director of energy finance studies at IEEFA, told NDTV.

Renewable energy capacity in Karnataka is 12.3 gigawatts (GW), the highest in India. The southern state's renewable energy capacity now exceeds its coal power capacity by 2.5 GW.

By March this year, Karnataka had a total solar capacity of 5 GW, wind capacity of 4.7 GW, and a small hydro, biomass and heat and power cogeneration portfolio of 2.6 GW.

A massive solar energy plant in Karnataka's Pavagada has helped the state take the lead in renewable energy. So much so that the Institute believes the power-deficit state could actually start sending power from renewable energy to other states.

"I think Karnataka is on the right track of its electricity sector transformation. Currently, 48 per cent of Karnataka's electricity generation capacity comes from renewable energy. So, I think Karnataka should look to building more export grid capacity to help the neighbouring states," said Kashish Shah, energy research associate at the IEEFA.

The oldest person in the world has died at age 117, officials in her home state in Japan confirmed Friday.

Chiyo Miyako, who was known to her family members as “the goddess,” died Sunday, said officials in Kanagawa prefecture, south of Tokyo.

Guinness World Records has confirmed that she was the world’s oldest person. Her replacement is yet to be announced by Guinness, but according to media reports, the new oldest person is Kane Tanaka, a 115-year-old woman who lives in a nursing home in Fukuoka, a city in southern Japan.

Japan's Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare said Tanaka is now the country's oldest person.

Miyako, born on May 2, 1901, became the world’s oldest person in April after Nabi Tajima, a fellow Japanese national from the southern Kikai island, died at age 117.

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.