The theme this year is, 'Global Partners for Global Challenges'. The summit will prioritise issues related to connectivity, trade and investment, sustainable development, climate change, terrorism, migration, maritime security and cyberspace.

The meeting will bring together Heads of state of 30 European and 21 Asian countries, besides top representatives of the European Union and Secretary General of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

Apart from the opening ceremony, Vice President will participate in the plenary session of the summit and have interactions with various stakeholders. He will also have bilateral meetings with the Heads of State of various countries on the sidelines of the summit.

On the first day, Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu is scheduled to hold one to one meeting with the King of Belgians King Phillipe at Presidential Palace in Brussels (at noon time). Naidu is likely to discuss the bilateral matters and issues of mutual interest and cooperation.

He is likely to seek more cooperation to strengthen bilateral relations and also to deal with the global challenges through Asia Europe Meeting (ASEM) platform. Vice President is scheduled to arrive at Europa Building for Opening Ceremony of ASEM Summit on Thursday evening (around 1925 hrs). This will be followed by his participation in the Special Session with the stakeholders.

Mangaluru, Oct 15 (PTI) ‘Beeg Ani Beegath’, a collection of short stories in Konkani by well-known writer, journalist and critic H M Pernal has bagged the prestigious ‘Vimala V Pai Vishwa’ Konkani best book award for the year 2018.

Konkani poet Sharathchandra Shenoy from Kochi won the Vishwa Konkani best poetry award for his book ‘Idam Na Mama,’ while Vishwanath M Shet from Uttara Kannada bagged the Vishwa Konkani lifetime achievement award.

Each award carries a purse of Rs one lakh each, a certificate, memento and shawl.

The awards will be presented at a function here on November 18 in the presence of sponsor T V Mohandas Pai, a press release from the World Konkani Centre said Monday.

H M Pernal is the pen name of Henry M Mendonca, a native of Pernal in Udupi district, who currently lives in Mangaluru.

‘Beeg Ani Beegath’ is his second short story collection after ‘Devak Sodullo Pado’ published in 2002.

He has also published three collections of poetry and written several articles and critiques.

Anna Burns won the Man Booker Prize on Tuesday for her novel “Milkman,” which is narrated by an unnamed 18-year-old girl living in 1970s Northern Ireland who is coerced into a relationship with a mysterious older married man with ties to a paramilitary group.

The Booker’s judges cited Ms. Burns’s use of dark humor to explore weighty themes like the perils of tribalism, state-sponsored terrorism, social division and the ways that sexual and political oppression often overlap.

“None of us had ever read anything like this before,” the writer and philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah, chair of this year’s judges, said in a statement. “It is a story of brutality, sexual encroachment and resistance threaded with mordant humor.”

The novel unfolds in an unnamed city during “the Troubles,” a prolonged civil conflict in Northern Ireland that gave rise to sectarian violence and guerrilla warfare. Against the background of this turbulent epoch, with the constant threat of car bombs and riots, the narrator deals with a menacing stalker, who is known only as Milkman, though he doesn’t deliver milk.

Neeraj Panwar hadn’t visited home in a year; but almost immediately after his brother Suraj Panwar won a silver medal in the men’s 5000m race walk at the Youth Olympics in Argentina, Neeraj boarded the first bus to Delhi from Jaipur and then on to Dehradun, where his family lives in Kaarabari village.

There are no celebrations planned at home but Suraj has definitely given his family all the reasons to celebrate. Not only is he the first Indian sportsman to win a medal in athletics at the 2018 Youth Olympics Games in Buenos, he also ended India’s drought for an athletics medal at the Games.

India and Tanzania on Tuesday signed two Memoranda of Understandings (MoUs ) in presence of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Tanzanian Foreign Minister Dr. Augustine Mahiga, in the national capital.

The agreements were signed following India-Tanzania 9th Session of Joint Commission on Economic, Technical and Scientific Cooperation in New Delhi.

The MoUs are between Foreign Service Institute of India and Centre for Foreign Relation, Tanzania and National Research Development Corporation and Tanzania Industrial Research and Development Corporation.

In a tweet, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said, comprehensive discussion held on stepping up cooperation in trade and investment, defence and security, development partnership, Science and Technology, oil and natural gas, culture and people-to-people relations.

The sixth meeting of the UAE – India High Level Joint Task Force on Investments (‘the Joint Task Force’) was held today in Mumbai to review the progress being made in addressing the agreed actions of the previous meeting held in Abu Dhabi in January 2018 and to elaborate a number of new key issues of mutual importance.

The meeting was co-chaired by H.H. Sheikh Hamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Chairman of the Abu Dhabi Crown Prince’s Court, and H.E. Suresh Prabhu, Minister of Commerce and Industry and Civil Aviation, Government of India. Senior officials from both countries also took part in the meeting.

The two sides noted the positive outcomes achieved by the Joint Task Force to date, expressed satisfaction at the level of bilateral trade and investment between the two countries, and agreed upon the need to further explore ways to facilitate investment in key Indian and UAE sectors with the potential for economic growth.

New Delhi: The government has increased the rate of interest for General Provident Fund (GPF) and other related schemes by 0.4 percentage points to 8% for the October-December quarter.

The rate is in line with that for Public Provident Fund (PPF).

The interest rate on GPF was 7.6% for the July-September quarter of 2018-19.

“... during the year 2018-2019, accumulations at the credit of subscribers to the General Provident Fund and other similar funds shall carry interest at the rate of 8% with effect from 1 October 2018, to 31 December 2018,” a Department of Economic Affairs’ notification said. The interest rate would apply on Provident Funds of central government employees, railways and defence forces.

Last month, the government announced that the interest on small savings, including NSC and PPF, will be hiked by up to 0.4 percentage point for the October-December quarter, to align it with rising deposit rates in the banks.

Neeraj Panwar had not visited home for more than an year now. But moments after his brother Suraj Panwar won a silver medal in the men’s 5000m race walk at Youth Olympics in Argentina, he boarded the first bus to Delhi from Jaipur and then to Dehradun where his family lives in Kaarabari village.

“I used to go to home close to Diwali but this year I think Diwali has arrived early, thanks to Suraj. I don’t think anyone at my home watched his race but I saw the live telecast on YouTube. I cannot wait to reach home. There are no celebrations but it will be great to be with the family,” Neeraj says.

Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu released a biography of late Anumolu Ramakrishna, a pioneer in the application of innovative systems and construction techniques in the Indian constuction sector.

The biography titled 'Building a Legacy' is authored by city-based Chartered Accountant V Pattabhi Ram.

Complimenting the biography, the Vice President Friday said it was in many ways an acknowledgement and recognition of Ramakrishna's tremendous contribution towards finding the rightful place for the Indian construction industry in the world.

Ramakrishna, former president and Managing Director at Larsen and Toubro, was posthumously awarded Padma Bhushan in 2014.

He was instrumental in constructing several path breaking buildings including Tirumala queue complex, Hitech city, and Nehru Indoor Stadium, a release said.

Ramakrishna was born in December 1939 and died on August 20, 2013 at Hyderabad.

Culture Minister Mahesh Sharma and Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri laid the foundation stone for Museum on Prime Ministers of India at Teen Murti Estate in New Delhi today.

The museum will depict modern India through collections relating to Prime Ministers of India, their lives, works and significant contributions made towards nation building. It will bring India's democratic experience alive to the visitors.

The proposed museum will include an orientation space, souvenir shop, space for organising talks, seminar halls and auditorium. Speaking on the occasion, Mr Sharma said, the new museum is expected to cost 271 crore rupees.

He said it will be constructed within one year.