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Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed meets with IMF managing director Christine Lagarde during the World Government Summit in Dubai.

DUBAI: Expatriates in the UAE have seen the cost of sending money home get-ting costlier recently as service providers have in-creased remittance fees to as much as 9.75pc. Charges for forwarding funds from the emirates to seven out of 12 popular destinations, including India, Philip-pines, Sri Lanka, Egypt and Indonesia, among others, went up by a few dirhams more in Dec 2018, accord-ing to the latest data com-piled by World bank.

Sending money to In-dia has gone up from Dh21 to Dh25.84 per transaction while average fees for cash transferred to the Philip-pines climbed from Dh21.7 to Dh23.40. Forwarding money to Egypt now costs Dh26.85 on average, up

from Dh25 in Sept 2018, while charges for Jordan-bound cash went upto Dh26.57. The cheapest country to send money to from the UAE is Bangla-desh, with an average cost of Dh13.65 per $200, while the costliest place to for-ward funds to is Sudan, at a whopping Dh71.66, up from Dh41.

The average remittance prices refer to the charges incurred by remitters, in-cluding the transfer fees and exchange rate margins, when transferring money through exchange houses, banks and other service providers in the UAE. Re-mittances are the backbone of many developing coun-tries outside the Gulf re-gion. They are mainly used to cover the costs of basic

expenses of expatriates’ de-pendents, such as housing, food, education and health-care. Transferred funds also go towards migrant workers’ investments, sav-ings, emergency and retire-ment funds back home.

World Bank has been tracking the fees, as part of a global campaign to reduce the cost of money transfer for foreign work-ers, especially those origi-nating from developing countries. Despite rising costs, South Asia remains the lowest cost-receiving region for money transfers, with an average cost of 5.23pc. Those in Sub-Sa-haran Africa are the most expensive place to send money to from the UAE, re-cording an average cost of 8.97pc.

3-Day holiday for Kuwait National DayKUWAIT CITY: The Ku-waiti cabinet has an-nounced a three-day holi-day for the public sector on the occasion of the coun-try’s National and Libera-tion Day.

The holiday will be-gin on Feb 24 (Sunday), with work resuming on Feb 27 (Wednesday) --- Feb 25 marks the day when Sheikh Abdullah Al-Salem Al-Sabah ascended to the throne in 1950.

Feb 24 is a day off, as it falls between two holi-days, while in cases of en-tities with special nature of work, it will be determined by competent authorities, taking into account public welfare.

Private business optimism in Dubai soars to six-year highDUBAI: Private business-es in Dubai are exuding greater optimism about what’s in store this year, touching levels last seen in 2012. Those sentiments were helped by new orders streaming through and im-proved productivity, ac-cording to the January data from Emirates NBD Econo-my Tracker Index.

The score was 55.8 in Jan and an improvement on the 53.7 in Dec. The fig-ure signals the “strongest overall improvement in the business climate since last June”. It was above

both the trends for 2018 as a whole (which was at 55) and the long-run series his-tory (55.2, since January 2010). The only detail that did not show an improve-ment was on the job cre-ation numbers – there was only a slight improvement in Jan which suggests com-panies retaining their focus on productivity and cost efficiencies.

The wholesale and re-tail sector posted the stron-gest overall improvement in business conditions at the start of 2018 with a score of 56.3, followed by

travel and tourism (54.1). The headline index for the construction industry was 53.8, little-changed from Dec’s nine-month low but still indicating growth.

“Both output and new orders improved in Jan, contributing to the strong headline reading,” said Khatija Haque, Head of MENA Research at Emir-ates NBD. “However, this continues to come at a cost to firms’ margins, as output prices contracted for the ninth consecutive month, albeit at a slower pace than seen in the last quarter.

“Some relief to companies came from a moderately more sedate growth in in-put prices, but the squeeze to margins remains evident in firms’ efforts to cut costs through curbing headcount – employment was posi-tive, but only marginally.”

Average input prices in the non-oil private sector economy rose for the tenth month running in Janu-ary, but the rate of inflation remained moderate. The weakest cost pressures were signalled in the travel and tourism space. Charges lev-ied for final goods and ser-vices fell for the ninth month running, though at the slow-est rate since last August. Of the three monitored sectors, only wholesale and retail posted lower sales prices.

Hindi to be used in Abu Dhabi courtABU DHABI: Hindi is to be-come the third official lan-guage used in the Abu Dha-bi court system as part of a move designed to improve access to justice.

Foreign nationals will be able to lodge claims and raise grievances in the lan-guage, which is widely spo-ken in India and by many expat workers in the UAE, in labour cases. It follows a change in the rules last year which required plaintiffs to translate all court docu-ments into English in civil and commercial cases, if the defendant was not an Ara-bic speaker. The Abu Dhabi Justice Department said the change would allow Hindi speakers to learn about liti-gation procedures and their rights and responsibilities without a language barrier. Interactive forms in Hindi

will be made available on its website.

Yousef Saeed Al Abri, the justice department under-secretary, said the change would help attract foreign investment and enhance Abu Dhabi’s reputation as a destination for skilled la-bour. It is part of a plan to reinforce the effectiveness and sustainability of judicial processes and ensure “uni-versal access to services.”

“The adoption of mul-tilingual interactive forms for claim sheets, grievances and requests, aims to pro-mote judicial services in line with the plan “Tomor-row 2021” and increase the transparency of litigation procedures through the provision of bilingual forms which allow foreigners to know the litigation proce-dures, (Contd. on page 2)

WASHINGTON: Economic recovery across the Mid-East and North Africa is set to slow down in 2019 and growth is likely to be weak-er than most expect, but the UAE at 3.5pc growth is likely to be the best per-former in the region in the run-up to Expo 2020 Dubai, analysts at Capital Econom-ics said.

In the Gulf, low oil pric-es shouldn’t cause major balance sheet strains, but tighter fiscal policy and oil output cuts will be the key reasons for weak economic growth to weaken, analysts observed in Capital Eco-nomics’ Mena Economic Outlook.

While the UAE’s econ-omy is likely to be the best performer in the Gulf, helped by preparations for Expo 2020 Dubai, Saudi Arabia’s economy is set for a slowdown this year on the back of oil output cuts and tighter fiscal policy, said the report. “Kuwait’s economy is the best-placed in the Gulf to cope with low oil prices, but even so we expect growth to re-main weak. Balance sheets in Bahrain and Oman are relatively fragile. Financial

UAE economy likely to be best performer

support from neighbours should help to keep dol-lar pegs intact. In return, though, austerity is likely to be stepped up, weighing on economic growth,” said the report.

Analysts expect UAE GDP growth to be a bit stronger this year than 2018. “Our forecast of 3.5pc lies above the consensus.”

The UAE has agreed with the rest of Opec to cut oil production. But the year-on-year change in oil output -- which is ul-timately what matters for GDP growth -- is actually likely to be a touch stronger this year than in 2018. “We doubt that the oil output cuts will provide a lift to oil prices --- in fact, we think that Brent crude will fall to $50 per barrel by end-2019. This won’t cause too many problems for the UAE. The current account will stay in surplus and the budget deficit is small and can be easily financed from the country’s large savings,” analysts said in the report.

In contrast to the rest of the Gulf, fiscal policy should remain fairly sup-portive. Infrastructure spending will be ramped

up as preparations for Expo 2020 Dubai gather pace. There will be a sizeable boost to the economy when the Expo rolls into town in 2020. However, increasing supply is likely to prolong the downturn in the prop-erty sector.

The boom in property

prices in 2012-14 was not driven by a run-up in credit so a repeat of the chal-lenges in 2009 is unlikely. In addition, a slowdown in the global economy is like-ly to weigh on activity in the UAE’s key manufactur-ing, tourism and logistics sectors.

Job profi le to change: WEFDUBAI: Today, the value of the creative jobs industry sits at $2.5 trillion. But by 2030, there will be a short-age of 85million jobs with-in this sector. The govern-ment is looking to fill this gap and in the coming fu-ture we must teach creativ-ity and imagination and get the youth interested in the creative sector; a sector which will be worth $8.5 trillion dollars by 2030,” Klaus Schwab, Executive Chairman of World Eco-nomic Forum (WEF) said.

During the opening session: “Globalisation -- How governments design the future of humanity?”, Gergawi, alongside Klaus Schwab, Executive Chair-man of World Economic Forum (WEF) discussed

how communication has changed and how it is shift-ing the focus of our daily habits. “Man has moved from bilateral communica-tion to multi-way commu-nication. It is a completely different process and adapt-ing to it is important. In the future we will have around 30 billion smart devices in our cars, homes linking world together. That will create a huge investment opportunity for govern-ments,” Gergawi said.

Future communication will change a lot of com-ponents in day-to -day life, like transportation with driverless cars and health-care with virtual doctors, so how the government copes with this change will

(Contd. on page 2)

NRI men mustregister theirmarriageNEW DELHI: Against the backdrop of cases of Indian women being trapped in fraudulent marriages with NRIs, a bill was introduced in the Rajya Sabha on Mon-day to make it compulsory to register such marriages within 30 days. If an NRI man fails to register his marriage within 30 days of date of marriage, his pass-port will be impounded or revoked. Also, it allows courts to attach properties, movable and immovable, of “proclaimed offenders” or people who fail to appear before courts despite war-rants being issued against them.

2 EMIGRATION Tuesday, February 12, 2019

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Indian H-1B visa holders hold a protest rally outside the White House with several demands for reforms in Washington.

Oil price shock not yet over: IMF chiefDUBAI: Oil exporters have not fully recovered from the dramatic oil price shock of 2014, head of IMF Christine Lagarde said and she cautioned against spending money on “white elephant projects.’’

“With revenues down, fiscal deficits are only slowly de-clining, despite significant reforms on both the spending and revenue sides, including the introduction of VAT and excise taxes,” Lagarde told a conference in Dubai. “This has led to a sharp increase in public debt, from 13pc of GDP in 2013 to 33pc in 2018.” Lagarde said the uncertainty in the growth outlook for oil exporters also reflected moves by countries to shift rapidly toward renewable energy over the new few decades, in line with the Paris climate change pact.

She said there was scope to improve fiscal frameworks in the MidEast with some of the weaknesses emanating from “short-termism and insufficient credibility.’’ La-garde said governments in the region might be tempted to favour white elephant projects instead of investment in people and productive potential. Saudi Arabia, the Mid-East’s largest economy, has announced plans to go ahead with three major projects including NEOM, a $500 billion economic zone announced by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The projects are backed by the country’s sov-ereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund.

New hope for Green Card applicants?WASHINGTON: Members of the US Senate and House of Representatives intro-duced matching bills that would end per-country lim-its on employment-based green cards, a long-stand-ing demand of advocacy groups of high-tech work-ers from India.

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) who has announced candidacy for 2020 presi-dential election and Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), intro-duced the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act that would also adjust per-country limits for fam-ily-based green cards. An identical bill was tabled in the House of Representa-tives by Congressmen Zoe Lofgren and Ken Buck, Chair and Ranking Mem-ber of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigra-tion and Citizenship with co-sponsorship of a biparti-san group of 112 members of Congress. “Ours is a na-tion of immigrants, and our

Kamala Harris

strength has always come from our diversity and our unity,” Sen. Harris said in a statement. “We must do

more to eliminate discrimi-natory backlogs and facili-tate family unity so that high-skilled immigrants are not vulnerable to exploita-tion and can stay in the US and continue to contribute

to the economy. I’m proud to join with Sen. Lee on this bipartisan legislation to ensure that our country remains vibrant and dy-namic,” she said.

Sen. Lee said that im-migrants should not be penalised because of their country of origin. “Treating people fairly and equally is part of our founding creed and the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act reflects that belief. Immi-gration is often a conten-tious issue, but we should not delay progress in areas where there is bipartisan consensus just because we have differences in other areas.”

The Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act bill also increases the per-country caps for family-sponsored green cards from seven per cent to 15pc. Without adding any new Green Cards, S. 386 (a bill to amend the Immigra-tion and Nationality Act to

eliminate the per-country numerical limitation for employment-based im-migrants) creates a “first-come, first-served” system that alleviates the backlogs and allows green cards to be awarded more efficient-ly.

The bill has also been endorsed by Immigration Voice, Compete America Coalition, the IT Industry Council, Google, Micro-soft, the US Chamber of Commerce, The Heritage Foundation, La Raza and many others. In a report last year, the Congressional Research Service noted that eliminating the per-country ceiling for employment-based Green Cards, a major stumbling block in the way of faster admission of law-ful permanent residents, would allow countries like India and China to domi-nate the path to American citizenship and would also end “de facto discrimina-tion” in the labor market.

UK, Switzerland to sign post-Brexit trade accord

Envoy pats India caucus for boosting ties with USWASHINGTON: The pow-erful Congressional India caucus, both in the House and the Senate, has played a sterling role in strength-ening and deepening of bilateral relationship be-tween the two largest de-mocracies of the world, In-dian Ambassador to the US Harsh V Shringla has said.

Addressing a gathering of top US lawmakers at a reception co-hosted in his honour by the co-Chairs of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian-Ameri-cans, Shringla said India has counted every step of the way. A record number of 60 members of the US House of Representatives and Sena-tors attended the reception held at the US Capital. Prom-inent among them were Sen-ators John Cornyn and Mark Warner, who are co-chairs of the Senate India Caucus and Congresswoman Tulsi Gab-bard among others.

Indian American Con-gressman Raja Krish-namoorthi and Congress-woman Pramila Jayapal

were also present at the event. Praising the “under-standing” of US lawmakers to steer the countries “ever

closer together”, the Indian diplomat said: “Many in this room will recall the sterling role played by the India caucus in getting us past the finish line on the landmark civil nuclear agreement.”

The designation of India as a major defence partner was also codified into law by the US Congress, thanks to the unstinting support by members of the India Cau-cus. Referring to Prime Min-ister Modi’s address to the

joint session of the US Con-gress that the Indo-US ties have “overcome the hesita-tions of history”, Shringla said he was looking for-ward to the same comfort, convergence and candour while working closely with members of Congress, par-ticularly the India Caucus.

“Our synergies and similarities are immense. Our values and love of free-dom identical. The spirit of entrepreneurship, in-novation and high regard to family and community define the best of both of our peoples,” Shringla said. Senator Cornyn said the bi-partisan group of more than 30 Senators who form the Senate India Caucus were working to promote India-US relationship. India and US have a “unique relation-ship” which is based on shared values and opportu-nities that are presented in this very dangerous world.

It was in 2004 that the Cornyn and the then Sena-tor Hillary Clinton founded the Senate India caucus. It is the largest bilateral cau-cus in the US Senate, Sena-tor Warner said. “We look forward to the continued success of the caucus and continue growing friend-ship between India and the US,” he said. India is an im-portant ally of the US and the Indian American com-munity has played a very important role in this, said Congressman Steny Hoyer.

Ambassador Harsh Shringla

IndiGo’s low fare offerMUMBAI: With IndiGo’s lucrative deal for domestic flyers valid till Feb 13, you can now fly at fares starting at Rs 899 for domestic flights and at Rs 3399 for International flights. This offer is available for travels from Feb 26, 2019 to Sept 26, 2019, as per the IndiGo website.

Under the offer, some attractively priced routes in-clude Delhi to Mumbai flight will cost around Rs 2,424 on Sept 19, 2019. Whereas, a flight from Delhi to Bengaluru is priced around Rs 2,699 for the same date. A Mumbai to Bengaluru flight will cost you a little more than Rs 2,000, according to the fares available on the IndiGo’s website.

During the offer, Delhi to Dubai flight was observed to be around Rs 6,670 for the one-way trip. The same from Mumbai can be availed at Rs 8,114 for Sept 19,2019. These prices are indicative and subject to change for various dates.

For a Mumbai to Singapore flight, you will be shelling about Rs 7,806. The same will cost around Rs 7,672 from Delhi. Other International destinations covered by the air-line include Phuket and Bangkok (Thailand), Doah (Qatar), Kuwait, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi (UAE) and Dhaka (Bangladesh).

The airline is also offering some exclusive benefits to various cardholders. American Express cardholders can get a cashback of 20pc upto Rs 2,000 by booking tickets via the card.

LONDON: Britain and Switzerland will sign an agreement to continue trading on preferential terms after Brexit, the Brit-ish trade department said, protecting a trade relation-ship worth $41.41 billion.

The formal signing of the deal, on which agree-ment had previously been announced, is one of only handful of concrete steps Britain has made toward ensuring that all the trade deals it currently benefits from as an EU member will continue after it leaves the bloc next month. “Not only will this help to support jobs throughout the UK but it will also be a solid foundation for us to build an even stronger trading relationship with Switzer-land as we leave the EU,” International Trade minis-ter Liam Fox said .

The deal reflects Swit-

zerland’s “mind the gap” strategy of ensuring seam-less trade ties with Brit-ain, regardless of whether London is able to strike and approve a formal exit agreement with Brussels by March 29, the date it is

scheduled to leave. Britain has reached an impasse in its last-minute renegotia-tion of an exit deal that it agreed with the EU last year but that was over-whelmingly rejected by the British parliament in Jan. The government said last month it expects Brit-ain will have most of the agreements it needs to rep-licate existing trade deals

between the EU and third countries ready by the end of March.

A similar continuity agreement has been an-nounced with Israel and “mutual recognition” deals have been agreed with Aus-tralia and New Zealand.But the head of the Confed-eration of British Industry, Carolyn Fairbairn said that the “unfolding nightmare” of Britain’s exit meant that major trade partners like Ja-pan and South Korea were reluctant to sign deals until they knew the exact shape of future EU-Britain ties.

“It will be the decisions that businesses take about jobs and investment — and they will reduce them — so you have less potential to trade globally, that will mean less investment in the future and that will mean fewer jobs in the fu-ture,” she told Sky News.

Indian origin renews driving licence at 97DUBAI: A 97-year-old Indian-origin man in the UAE has got his driving li-cence renewed for the next four years. Homi Dhunji-boy Mehta, who was born in 1922, could become the first centenarian to be driving on Dubai roads in three years. His licence is valid until Oct 2023.

Coincidentally, Prince Philip, the 97-year-old husband of British Queen Elizabeth II, has volun-tarily surrendered his driving licence, weeks af-ter the duke miraculously escaped unhurt in a terri-fying accident that injured two women in another car. Mehta, a Kenyan of In-dian descent, lives alone and is in no hurry to hit the roads as he thinks cars

make people lazy. He pre-fers to walk -- sometimes up to four hours daily.

The long-time Dubai resident, who never mar-ried, last drove a vehicle in 2004. He now uses public transport or travels around on foot. “Don’t tell anyone. It’s the secret of my robust health and long life. And yes, I don’t smoke or drink,” Mehta says as he chuckles. He came to Dubai in 1980 and took up an account-ing job at a five star hotel where he worked until 2002 when a routine back-ground check of employees revealed his age and he was asked to put in his papers. “I was 80 then with no fam-ily and nowhere to go so I dug into my lifetime’s sav-ings and bought a one-bed-

room apartment in the city to secure a life-long residency in the safe en-virons of Dubai.

“I have been living as a loner for the most part of life as I never got mar-ried. I have a younger sister in the UK who I visit every summer but I banished all thoughts of relocating there after I was mugged in London in broad day light some years ago. I can’t imagine that happening in Dubai so I would rather stay here,” Mehta said. All of Mehta’s friends are long dead and the only support he has here is from mem-bers of law firm Al Midfa and Associates whom he contacted in 2004 to help draft a will.

Job profi le to change...(Contd. from page 1)determine its success. As mentioned by Ger-gawi, we are living in a “changing world and are witnessing political and social changes”. It’s a rapidly changing situation so creating opportunities for people and investing in the right areas, like improved communica-tion and gaps in creative employment sector will carve out a better future for people. In a question to Schwab, Gergawi asked: “How will the fourth industrial revolution impact cities?” And Schwab answered: “Cities have to create an entrepreneurship-friendly eco-system. Imagination and innovation will drive tomorrow. They will be the key factors of global competitiveness. Cities have to be-come role models for creativity and they have to create an atmosphere where startups can flourish. The government has a role to play in that. Cities have to become a platform; this platform has to be multi-stakeholder.”

Hindi to be used...(Contd. from page 1) their rights and duties without a language barrier,” Al Abri said. “This in addition to facilitating registration procedures to the public through simplified and easy forms and raising litigants’ legal awareness via in-teractive forms of the statements of claims, to ensure access to the legal materials related to the subject of the dispute.”

Authorities have also created bi-lingual language guides to explain complex legal terms and used infographics in an effort to help people understand court processes. Last November, in a first for the region, Abu Dhabi introduced a rule that all documents in civil and commercial cases should be presented to non-Arabic defendants in Eng-lish.

“Our courts system is going hand in hand with the ambitious economic plans of our leaders,” Al Abri said at the time.

Lady Gaga wins three GrammysLOS ANGELES: Childish Gambino’s searing “This is America” became the first hip-hop track to win a song of the year Grammy on Sunday, while Lady Gaga dominated the early awards and for-mer US First Lady Michelle Obama made a surprise ap-pearance at the event.

Lady Gaga’s hit song “Shallow” from the movie “A Star is Born” won two Grammys, while the mu-sician-turned actress took a third Grammy home for her “Joanne (Where Do You Think You’re Going)”, which won for pop solo performance. Already, a show with a strong lineup of female performers and nominees, the Grammys sprung a surprise by in-cluding Obama in an open-ing segment that also fea-tured Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez, actress Jada Pinkett Smith and host Alicia Keys talking about the power of music. “From the Motown records I wore out on the (Chicago) Southside to the ‘Who Run the World’ songs that fuelled me through this last decade, music has always helped me tell my story,” Obama told the cheering celebrity audience in Los Angeles.

“It allows us to hear one another, to invite one an-other in,” Obama added.

Rapper Childish Gam-bino’s “This is America,” about police brutality and racism, won the first big award — song of the year — as well as best music video, and best rap performance.

3GULF JOBS & OPPORTUNITIESTuesday, February 12, 2019

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4 GULF JOBS & OPPORTUNITIES Tuesday, February 12, 2019

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MUMBAI: A team of 14 BTech stu-dents across departments, working with the Unmesh Mashruwala Inno-vation Cell (UMIC), IIT Bombay, won the Asia Pacific regionals of Student Design Competition (SDC), an annual event organised by the American Society of Mechanical Engineering (ASME).

The competition was held in Vel-lore Institute of Technology (VIT) from February 1 to 3.

UMIC, IIT Bombay, will now repre-sent India and the Asia-Pacific region in the world finals of ASME-SDC,19’ to be held in Utah, USA, in November. This year’s problem statement was to make a robot capable of picking and

placing balls of different diameters (from ping pong to basketballs) placed on a pipe 3 to 5 cm in diameter and 20 cm in height. There were one-on-one matches and the team with highest score won the round.

IIT Bombay came first in the com-petition in which 21 teams, including IIT Roorkee, IIT Indore, three teams from the National Institute of Technol-ogy, an international team from Hong Kong Polytechnic University and VIT participated. The second place was secured by VIT Vellore that scored 24 points. Team UMIC had 26 points in the finals.

“While we have won the Asia-Pacific regionals several times in the past, we won the finals in 2017, which was held at Florida. The statement at the competition is going to remain the same, with participation from all over the world. Our robot took two minutes and 45 seconds to complete the task. We will try fast motors and different mechanisms in order to reduce the time by half,” said Deepak Kumar, a fourth-year student of aerospace en-gineering and a member of the team, while talking about the Utah event.

IIT-B to represent India in Intl design contest

MUMBAI: With more and more professionals focusing on up-skilling for new-age job roles, the education and training sector is expected to witness accelerated hir-ing in 2019, according to a survey.

“It is heartening to see the education, training and language sector picking up pace, as professionals gear themselves up by picking up new skills for tech-nologically advanced job roles emerging across IT and non-IT sectors alike,” online job portal Shine.com CEO Zairus Master said.

The education and training sector had regis-

NEW DELHI: US retail ma-jor Walmart, which invested $ 16 billion in Flipkart, said it is committed to the Indian market and is optimistic despite recent changes in the FDI policy for e-commerce firms in the country.

The Bentonville-based retailing major’s statement came after a recent report by global consultancy firm Morgan Stanley, which had hinted that Walmart may quit Flipkart as the new foreign direct investment (FDI) policy came into ef-fect, which would lower its profitability in the long run.

Morgan Stanley, in a report titled ‘Assessing Flip-kart Risk to Walmart EPS’ dated February 4, claimed that “an exit is likely, not

Education, training sectors may see increase in hiring this year

Walmart is here to stay inspite of revised FDI e-commerce norms

tered a significant uptick in 2018 as well, the survey said.

Numerous tech start-ups in these two sectors were launched in 2018, propelling growth and job creation in 2019 as well.

For this survey, Shine.com leveraged its pool of data collated over the past year to map the Indian hiring landscape, focusing on key growth regions and functional areas across industries.

Further, the survey re-vealed that IT-software, banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), man-ufacturing and BPO/KPO, which were the most ac-

completely out of the ques-tion, with the Indian e-commerce market becoming more complicated.”

“Walmart’s and Flip-kart’s commitment to India is deep and long term. Despite the recent changes in regulations, we remain op-timistic about the country,” said Dirk Van d e n B e r g h e , Executive Vice President and Regional CEO Walmart Asia and Canada.

He further added, “We will continue to focus on serving customers, creating sustained economic growth and bringing sustainable benefits to the country,

tive recruitment sectors in 2017, continued to hold top positions in 2018 as well.

W i t h i n the IT/soft-ware sector, job require-ments have i n c r e a s e d across tech-nologies such as data sci-ence, artifi-cial intelli-gence (AI), cybersecurity and progres-sive Apps.

While job positions are on the rise, m a j o r u p -

including employment gen-eration, supporting small businesses and farmers, and growing Indian exports to Walmart’s global markets.”

Tightening norms for e-commerce firms having foreign investment, the

government, from Feb-ruary 1, barred online marketplaces like Flipkart and Amazon from selling products of companies where they hold stakes

skilling is required for professionals to take up these roles.

and banned exclusive mar-keting arrangements that could influence product price.

The revised policy on FDI in online retail, issued by the commerce and in-dustry ministry, also said

that these firms have to o f fer equal services or facilities to all its vendors without discrimination.

L a s t y e a r on August 18, Wa l m a r t h a d completed acqui-sition of 77 per

cent stake in Flipkart for about $ 16 billion (Rest 1.05 lakh crore), a deal which gave the US retailer access to the Indian e-commerce market.

Top metro cities like Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai have retained

their dominant positions as the regions with the highest talent demand, it said.

However, emerging cit-ies such as Hyderabad, Pune, Kolkata, and Ahmed-abad also staked their claim as regional job hubs, having performed excep-tionally well in terms of hiring in 2018, it added.

In fact, on the back of its burgeoning IT sector, Hyderabad broke through into the top 5 cities for hiring in the past year.

The report noted that the growth trend witnessed across tier-II cities can be attributed to the sprawl-ing FMCG and consumer

durables, pharmaceuticals and health care, and en-ergy and renewable sectors in these geographies.

Furthermore, as more manufacturing plants are set up, new jobs will be created in tier II-III cities.

The rise of fintech firms, mobile wallets and numerous payment apps has ensured the steady growth of the BFSI sector, which will also retain its spot in the highest job creating industries in 2019.

“In 2019 and beyond, we are expecting to see the top hiring cities including Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi to retain their top positions,” Master added.

MUMBAI: Reliance Jio’s third-generation JioPhone is expected to be launched in India July this year. JioPhone 3 is said to carry a price tag of Rs 4,500, the most expensive in the JioPhone series yet.

According to a report by BeetelBite, a Jio executive revealed details of the up-coming JioPhone 3. The new Jio handset will feature a re-freshed design with a 5-inch touchscreen display. It will pack 2GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage along with microSD card support for further expansion.

In the camera depart-ment, JioPhone 3 will come with a 5-megapixel rear camera, and a 2-megapixel selfie camera. The previous JioPhone and JioPhone 2

Reliance JioPhone 3 launch expected in July

run on KaiOS, but this may not be the case for JioPhone 3. The report states that JioPhone 3 could run on Google’s Android Go OS.

In terms of availability, pre-orders for J io -Phone 3 will start in July with de-liveries happen-ing in August. The timeline for the launch is the same as JioPhone 2, and it will be available through Jio’s of-ficial website, Jio stores and Reli-ance Digital outlets.

The leaked specifica-tions of JioPhone 3 show a major improvement from the previous generation. To recall, JioPhone 2 comes

with 512MB of RAM and 4GB of storage which is further expandable up to 128GB. It has a 2.4-inch QVGA display, 2-megapixel

rear camera and a VGA camera up front. JioPhone 2 is fuelled by a 2,000mAh battery, and supports 4G VoLTE, FM, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and NFC as well.

NATIONAL

Hiring, production outlook improves in mfg: FicciNEW DELHI: A quarterly survey by in-dustry body FICCI portrays a better out-look for the manufacturing sector with 54pc of respondents reporting higher production from October to December quarter of 2018-19 compared to 47 in the same quarter of the previous year.

The percentage of respondents reporting low production was only

13.5pc in Q3 2018-19 as compared to 15pc in Q3 of 2017-18. Similarly, 70pc of respondents mentioned that they were not likely to hire an additional workforce in Q3 of 2017-18. This per-centage has come down to 65pc for Q3 of 2018-19. Going forward it is expected that the hiring scenario will improve further, noted the survey.

NATIONAL JOBS & CAREERS 5Tuesday, February 12, 2019

Puzzle #: 36 Diffi culty : Easy

Sudoku PuzzleRules: To solve a Sudoku puzzle, every digit from 1 to 9 must appear in each of the nine vertical columns, in each of the nine hori-zontal rows and in each of the nine boxes.Solution for Puzzle # 36 will be in next issue.

Fun Corner

Sudoku Puzzle 35 Answer

Your wellness

A group of Indian re-searchers has pro-posed additional therapeutic strategies to treat a string of ailments observed in HIV patients that they say may have a common source.

The group from Jawaha-rlal Nehru University, New Delhi, believes that the inflammation and illness seen in HIV-infected chil-dren and adults even after they have received stan-dard anti-retroviral therapy (ART) may be the result of persistent changes in their gut microbe populations.

Their study has revealed a significantly higher abun-dance of bacteria called Prevotella in the intestines of HIV-infected and ART-treated children, compared with the intestines of unin-fected children.

It has also identified molecular signatures of in-flammation in these chil-dren, which the research-ers believe were caused by

Gut feel drives HIV battlethe ballooning populations of the intestinal Prevotella.

Multiple studies in adults outside India too have shown that HIV infec-tions change the intestinal microbial population.

“We’re proposing ad-ditional therapeutic strate-gies designed to normalise the gut microbiome popu-lations as an adjunct to the standard ART,” said Ravi Tandon, assistant professor of biotechnology at JNU, who led the Indian study on children.

Children and adults worldwide routinely re-ceive ART drugs — combi-nations of medicines that suppress the replication of HIV — that have in most cases rendered HIV infec-tion a chronic disease with lifelong treatment.

The use of ART in HIV-infected pregnant women and newborns exposed to maternal HIV infections is believed to have con-tributed to the 70 per cent

decline in perinatal HIV in-fections (those contracted just before or after birth) between 2000 and 2015.

But while ART sup-presses viral replication, HIV-infected adults and children continue to be at increased risk of multiple

health disorders, from car-diovascular disease and obesity to liver and kidney disease.

The JNU researchers feel that these disorders are linked to inflammation caused by the changes in the gut microbe population.

At JNU, research schol-

ar Urvinder Kaur, super-vised by Tandon, conduct-ed what is being described as the first study to inves-tigate the differences in the pattern of gut microbes between HIV-infected and uninfected children.

Their study of faecal

samples drawn from two groups children found a significantly higher abun-dance of Prevotella in the infected children. The sci-entists also found higher-than-normal levels of an inflammatory chemical called interferon gamma-induced protein-10 in the

bloodstreams of HIV-in-fected children.

Their findings, pub-lished in the journal Scien-tific Reports, suggest that the increasing Prevotella population results in bacte-rial products being released into the bloodstream and enhancing inflammation.

“We need more stud-ies to try and understand the inflammation but if this is Prevotalla-driven inflammation, therapeu-tic strategies should aim to normalise gut micro-bial populations, perhaps through probiotics,” Tan-don said.

Probiotics are human-friendly bacteria -– such as the lactobacilli found in curd -– that are increasingly being recognised as playing a key role in good health.

Doctors sometimes prescribe probiotics to pa-tients receiving antibiotics to ensure that the gut re-mains well populated with friendly bacteria.

Now pill could replace injections to deliver insulin: StudyResearchers have de-veloped a drug cap-sule that could be used to deliver oral doses of insulin, potentially re-placing injections for pa-tients with Type-2 diabe-tes, says a new study.

About the size of a blue-berry, the capsule contains a single and small needle made of compressed insu-

lin, which is injected after the c a p s u l e reaches the

stomach. The study showed that

the capsule could deliver enough insulin to lower blood sugar to levels com-parable to those produced by injections given through skin. They also demon-strated that the device can be adapted to deliver other protein drugs.

Zinc defi ciency may lead to high BPHigh blood pressure or hypertension has been linked to zinc deficiency, according to a new study by the American Journal of Physiology-Renal Physiology. Zinc deficiency

is common in individuals with chronic kidney dis-eases and Type 2 diabetes and in those patients, there is an increased likelihood of hypertension.

The findings revealed, “Zinc deficiency (ZnD) is a common comorbidity of many chronic diseases. In these settings, ZnD exacer-bates hypertension.” Blood

pressure control depends on how kidneys excrete sodium into the urine or reabsorb it into the body through the sodium chlo-ride cotransporter (NCC). Less sodium in the urine is

related to increased blood pressure levels.

For the study, the re-searchers fed adult mice with a zinc-adequate diet and another set of mice with a zinc-deficient diet. Soon enough, the mice with lower levels of deficiency developed hypertension.

A remaining set of mice were firstly given a zinc-ad-

equate diet followed by hy-drochlorothiazide (HCTZ), which is an NCC inhibi-tor. The blood pressure of these mice also returned to normal as the NCC stopped pumping sodium back into the body thus allowing urine to flush away.

The study concluded, “These data indicate that 1) Zn2+ (zinc) contributes to BP regulation via modulating renal Na+ handling, 2) renal NCC mediates ZnD-induced hypertension and 3) NCC is a Zn2+ regulated transport-er that is u p r e g u -lated with ZnD. This study links dysregulated renal Na+ handling to ZnD-induced hypertension. Furthermore, NCC is identified as a novel mechanism by which Zn2+ regulates BP. Understanding the mechanisms of ZnD-in-duced BP dysregulation may have important therapeutic impact on hypertension.”

“We are really hopeful that this new type of cap-sule could someday help diabetic patients and per-haps anyone who requires therapies that can now only be given by injection or infusion,” said Robert Langer, Professor at the Ko-chi Institute for Integrative

Cancer Research in Britain.The tip of the needle

is made of nearly 100 per cent compressed, freeze-dried insulin.

When the capsule is swallowed, water in the stomach dissolves the sug-ar disk, releasing the spring and injecting the needle into the stomach wall.

The stomach wall has

no pain receptors, so the patients would not be able to feel the prick of the in-jection. To ensure that the drug is injected into the stomach wall, the research-ers designed their system so that no matter how the capsule lands in the stom-ach, it can orient itself so the needle is in contact with the lining of the stom-ach.

The findings, published in the journal Science, showed that the research-ers could successfully de-

liver up to 300 micrograms of insulin.

More recently, they have been able to increase the dose to 5 milligrams, which is comparable to the amount that a patient with Type-2 diabetes would need to inject.

Furthermore, no ad-

verse effects from the cap-sule was found, which is made from biodegradable polymer and stainless steel components.

Importantly, this type of drug delivery could be useful for any protein drug that normally has to be in-jected, such as immuno-suppressants used to treat rheumatoid arthritis or inflammatory bowel dis-ease and may also work for nucleic acids such as DNA and RNA, according to the researchers.

WBPRB announces vacancies for 8419 male constable postsWest Bengal Po-lice Recruitment Board (WB-PRB) has invited applica-tions for recruitment of

8419 male constables. Can-didates can apply online at the official website. The last date to apply is March 5, 2019.

The applicants must have cleared the Madhya-maik examination from the state board’s class 12, or an equivalent qualification. The applicants should not be older than 27 years old as on 1 January 2019, the of-ficial notification said.

The applicants must also be able to speak, read, and write in Bengali however,

these criteria is not compul-sory for people who are per-manent residents of Darjeel-ing and Kalimpong districts, the notification reads.

West Bengal police re-cruitment 2019: Pay scale

The candidates will be in the pay band of Rs Rs 5,400 to Rs 25,200 with a grade pay of Rs 2,600

Recruitment procedureThe exam will be held

in three phases: Written exam, Physical measure-ment test and interview. The written exam will be of two parts- Preliminary and mains carrying 100 marks and 85 marks, respective-ly. Interview will carry 15 marks.

Exam patternPrelims - 100 marksGeneral Awareness and

General Knowledge-50 marksElementary Mathematics

(Madhyamik)- 30 marksReasoning- 20 marksMains- 85 marksGeneral Awareness and

General Knowledge- 25 marksEnglish- 25 marksElementary Mathematics

(Madhyamik Standard)- 20 marks

Reasoning and Logical Analysis- 15 marks

Negative marking: 1 mark for each 4 wrong questions will be deducted.

Direct link for official notice for West Bengal Po-lice Recruitment 2019

India, Russia discuss on mutual recognition of degreesIndia and Russia are dis-cussing “point-by-point” provisions of proposed agreement regarding mu-tual recognition of degrees and diplomas, said Yelena Afanasyeva who headed a delegation of Russian sena-tors to promote coopera-tion between the two coun-tries through Parliamentary Friendship Group.

Many Indian students, es-pecially the ones who go to Russia to study medicine, are affected by the absence of this mutual recognition agreement. India and Rus-sia have been discussing the proposed agreement re-garding mutual acceptance of degrees and diplomas for

many years now.“The representatives of

the governments of both sides are now discussing the

point-by-point provisions of this document,” she said.

“One of the difficulties that we have discussed with our colleagues is that the ne-cessity of urging our govern-

ments to sign an agreement of mutual acceptance of the diplomas and degrees, especially in the medical

sphere,” Afanasyeva said.“There was such a docu-

ment – but between the USSR and the Republic of India. So, we have this kind of experience. But the USSR

is no more, so we need a new one (agreement docu-ment),” she said.

Afanasyeva said around 9,500 students are study-ing in Russia and more than 100 of them are studying at the expenses of the Russian government. The Russian Senators’ delegation recent-ly visited India and met Ra-jya Sabha Deputy Chairman Harivansh Narayan Singh, BJP’s National General Sec-retary Ram Madhav, former Congress president Sonia Gandhi and other leaders.

The delegation also met BJP Lok Sabha MP Hema Malini, who chairs the In-dia-Russia Parliamentary Friendship Group.

Union Bank invites application for 100 postsThe Union Bank has issued no-tification for posts of armed guard in Subordinate Cadre. Preferences shall be given to ex-ser-vicemen. Those applying may do so through prescribed format on or be-fore February 18.

Dates to rememberLast date to apply: February 18Vacancy Details:Armed Guard (Ex-Serviceman)-

100 positions

Eligibility Criteria:Educational Qualification:

Candidates applying for these posts must have passed class X or its equivalent. However, applicants must not have passed class XII or its equivalent.

Age limit for the subordinate armed guard post:

The minimum age of candidates apply must be 18, while the maxi-mum must be 25 years of age. It is to

be noted that age relaxation would be given to as per government norms to SC/ST/OBC/PWD/Women/

Selection procedure:Candidates will be selected through

examination (online) on the basis of merit and physical fitness test.

How to Apply:Those willing to apply may do so

through the BCPL’s Website www.unionbankofindia.co.in. The last date to apply is February 18.

6 IN FOCUS Tuesday, February 12, 2019

I am in UAE and I have given in my notice but as I am in a sales role, my employer does not want me to work my notice pe-riod. Usually, I’d be happy to sit at home and be paid but I have a new job to go to and would like to start as soon as I can. I think my current boss would not mind me finishing soon, but can we do this by law?

While it is standard to expect an employee to work during their notice period, there are situations when an employer wants to stop someone dealing with customers immediate-ly. An employer can put someone on “garden-ing leave”, where they okay their notice period without actually working. However, provided both parties are in full agreement employ-ment can be formally terminated sooner than the end of the notice period. Provided the cur-rent visa is cancelled and monies owed are paid in full, there is no reason why you can-not take up a new role very quickly.

Is it legal?I am based in India and I have recently

received a job offer from a university in Dubai. They have already issued the job offer letter, however, they advised me to start work soon after I arrive in the coun-try on a visit visa. They say they will start processing the employment visa, once I start working. Will it be legally safe on my part to accept their proposal to work on my visit/tourist visa and to wait to get my employment visa processed?

It is not legal for anyone to undertake employment on a visit or tourist visa but the situation is slightly different if an em-ployer has made a formal application for a residency visa. A company cannot properly start the process until a new employee is in the country, so it is not unusual for some-one to be working while the application is in process. I must stress that an application should have started by the time the employ-ee starts working so that the completion is a formality. There is an informal grace period for the paperwork to be finalised but an em-ployer must have all the documents in hand. This does not mean the employer can de-lay before applying as records can easily be checked and the process should really only take a couple of weeks in most cases. Under no circumstances is an employer permitted to employ someone without a visa and then apply at a later date such as after a proba-tionary period as a way of potentially saving money. If in doubt, an employee should ask for evidence of the application having been submitted. To quote from the UAE govern-ment’s official website: “Working without first obtaining the proper visa status is ille-gal and could lead to imprisonment, fines and/or deportation. The penalties apply to both: the employer and the employee.

Job loss and visaI am a widow staying with my two chil-

dren in our own apartment in Dubai. Cur-rently, I am employed. But soon, my company will shut down and hence, I won’t have a job and my employment visa will be cancelled. My children are schooling here in Dubai and in order to complete their crucial academic year, I intend to stay in Dubai for some more time. I would like to know what are the op-tions for getting a visa for me and my kids. Are we eligible for an investor licence? If yes, what is the procedure to get one?

Pursuant to your queries, you may obtain a residence visa against the property you own in the emirate of Dubai. Property owners who have purchased a property of a minimum value of Dh1 million are entitled to apply for residence visa in the UAE, provided such a property has been completed and handed over to its owner by the developer. Such a visa is valid for two years. The property owner ini-tially has to approach the Dubai Land Depart-ment along with original passport, original title deed, NOC from the developer and copy of current visa page (if any). Based on the let-ter issued by the Dubai Land Department, you need to thereafter approach the Dubai Police for issuance of certificate of good conduct and later to the Dubai Economic Department along with the relevant documents and apply for an investor licence.

Changing jobsI work as mechanical engineer for a

mainland company. I joined the company on an unlimited contract in May, 2018 but I am not happy with my salary, which is just Dh3,000 a month and I have found another job with a better salary package so I want to make a change. My questions are: 1. Will a ban be imposed if I give the 30-day notice period to the company when I submit my resignation? 2. Will I have to compensate my company for visa expenses?

You had been working for this com-

Can I skip my ‘gardening leave’ ?pany for just four months at time of writ-ing so if you give notice to leave you will have worked for fewer than six months at the time of departure. This is relevant as there are cases where someone in this po-sition could receive a ban for leaving at this stage. It all depends on the skill level of your visa. Workers in skill categories one to three will not face a six-month employ-ment ban should they wish to move to a new employer after completing their notice period. This covers a wide range of jobs for people working in professional roles with degrees or professional diplomas as well as most office-based staff. Categories four and five cover individuals in primarily un-skilled roles. I expect a mechanical engineer to have some professional qualifications, so they should fall in to one of the higher cat-egories. This means that FA will not receive a ban for leaving this employment if proper notice is given. Furthermore, you are not li-able to compensate your employer for any visa costs when he leaves service as it is the employer’s responsibility to pay for all em-ployment-related costs such as visa fees. Em-ployers are not permitted to pass on the costs to employees and this is covered in Ministe-rial Order 52 of 1989, Article-6 which makes it clear that all expenses incurred in taking on of an employee must be borne by the em-ployer and cannot be passed on.

Visa woesI am working for a company on an un-

limited contract and recently submitted my resignation. However, my visa will ex-pire in 20 days, while the duration of my notice period is two months. Do I still need to serve my full notice period even though my visa is expiring? What are the options open to me? Can my employer renew it for just 40 days and then cancel it or can I just request cancellation of visa and leave?

Pursuant to your queries, we assume that you are employed by a mainland com-pany in the UAE and your employment is governed by Federal Law No. 8 of 1980 reg-ulating employment relations in the UAE (the “Employment Law”’) and subsequent ministerial orders issued by the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation. It should be noted that employment contract and the residence visa are two different as-pects. Since you are employed on an em-ployment contract of unlimited duration, you are to serve notice period even though your residence visa sponsored by your em-ployer is expiring shortly. The unlimited term of employment contract usually does not have an end-date. Since there is no end date for employment contracts of unlimited duration, it cannot be terminated only for the reason of expiry of a residence visa. Ar-ticle 1(II) of the ministerial decree no. 775 of 2015 on rules and conditions for the termi-nation of employment relations covers the terms and conditions for termination of an unlimited term of the employment contract. It states: “An employment relation between employer and employee may be terminated In the case of unlimited (not term-bound) contracts if any of the following instances occur: Based on the aforementioned provi-sion of law, you may request your employer to terminate the contract on mutual under-standing. In the event the employer does not agree for mutual termination, you may have to pay salary in lieu of 40 days no-tice period for early termination of the em-ployment contract. This is in accordance with Article 119 of the Employment Law. It states, “Where an employer or an employee fails to give the other party notice of the termination of the contract or reduces the period of the notice, the party obliged to give notice shall pay the other party com-pensation, called “‘compensation in lieu of notice ‘‘, even where no prejudice has been sustained by the other party as a result of such failure or reduction. The said com-pensation shall be equal to the employee’s remuneration in respect of the entire period of notice or the time by which it was re-duced. Compensation in lieu of notice shall be calculated on the basis of the remunera-tion last received, in the case of employee remunerated on a monthly, weekly, daily or hourly basis or in the case of an employee remunerated at piece rates, on the basis of the average daily remuneration referred to in Article 57 of this Law.”

Your employer may not renew your residence visa only for the sake of 40 days, rather he would mutually terminate the em-ployer contract, cancel your visa and pay your end of service benefits. Or else the em-ployer may ask you to pay ‘compensation in lieu of notice for 40 days and thereafter may proceed to cancel your residence visa and settle your end-of- service benefits.

Mahmood Bangara, Vipul, BR Shetty and Keshav Karve at the budget seminar in Dubai.

DUBAI: India should allow NRIs to carry more gold in personal baggage capacity when travelling back which is a win-win situation for the country and its citizens, said a senior official of Dubai Gold and Jewellery Group (DGJG). Siroya Chandra Prakash, vice-chairman of DGJG, said it would be a practical step to allow NRIs to carry more gold as it will lower mar-gins for the parallel trade and the yel-low metal will also become more af-fordable for the residents of India.

As part of personal baggage, New Delhi had reduced carrying 10kg to one kg for people flying into India, which is the world’s largest consum-er of gold. In 2018, India, the second largest bar and coin market in the world, saw annual demand falling four per cent to 106.2 tonnes. The weakness of the Indian rupee pushed the gold price to Rs 31,900 per 10gm during Oct, its highest level since June 2012. While gold jewellery de-mand also fell one per cent to 598 tonnes. “For personal baggage, an NRI who lived outside India for more than 180 days continuously, could import

Should NRIs be allowed to bring in more gold?

10 kg of gold on the payment of duty. That has been brought down to one kg ,” said Prakash, who is also the owner of Siroya Jewellers in Dubai.

“It is very practical step for In-dia. By increasing the allowance, the margins will go down for the paral-lel trade and the gold will become more affordable; today everything is streamlined and transparent. Plus, more and more people want to fol-low the rule of law. So, I think it is high time that the government of In-dia should reconsider and start charg-ing four to six per cent duty rather than 10pc on carrying gold to India,” Prakash said on the sidelines of a conference here.

The conference was hosted by The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) - Dubai Chapter, to dis-cuss the Indian budget. Vipul, India’s Consul General in Dubai, BR Shetty, chairman, UAE Exchange; Mahmood Bangara, chairman, ICAI’s Dubai Chapter and Raju Menon, chairman, Kreston Menon among others, also addressed the conference.

Mahmood Bangara said consider-

ing the huge NRI remittance of about $80 billion annually, any differential taxes on NRIs may ideally be with-drawn. “Furthermore, incentives for NRI investments would facilitate higher foreign exchange inflow which will be more beneficial than the foreign direct investment,” he sug-gested. Bangara noted that the Indian story is becoming an integral part of the world’s story. “Indian service sec-tor is growing rapidly with a share of about 54pc , a positive sign of engage-ment of huge young population and as many more to be employed,” he added. India’s consul general Vipul said India economy is good to invest in and it should remain so in the fore-seeable future for NRIs and govern-ment of UAE and private businesses. “This is one country where one gets best of returns.”

He added that the Indian econo-my continued its high growth path of more than seven per cent and re-mains the fastest growing economy among large countries globally. “We are on our way to become $5 trillion economy in the next five years or so.”

Punjab to give 6pc DA to its employeesCHANDIGARH: The Pun-jab government has patted its back for announcing six dearness allowance (DA) for 3.5 lakh employees and three lakh pensioners in the state. But this DA in-stalment, entailing a bur-den of Rs 720 crore on the exchequer, is unlikely to be paid immediately. Employ-ees have thus rejected the announcement, saying it is nothing more than a means to appease them before the general election.

Punjab Civil Secretariat Staff Association president Sukhchain Singh Khera said the announcement amounted to nothing. “At present, three instalments of DA are yet to be paid, be-

sides arrears for 22 months on the unreleased DA. What is the use of making announcements, when the money is not to be paid im-mediately?” he said.

Finance Minister Man-preet Singh Badal, however, maintained that this six DA would be credited along with the next month’s salary. “We know the state of finances. But we have stretched our limit to announce a mas-sive six per cent DA, payable from Feb 1,” he said.

Employees are, how-ever, sceptical and said considering the poor rev-enue collection and huge revenue deficit this year, it was unlikely that this instalment would be re-

leased any soon. It may be noted that three earlier announced instalments of DA are already pending to-wards employees and pen-sioners. These include four per cent DA announced in Jan 2017, three per cent in June 2017 and three per cent in January 2018.

Ever since taking over in March 2017, the Con-gress government has paid just one DA instalment of six per cent in June 2018. The total dues on account of DA amount to Rs 1,800 crore, while the arrears for unpaid DA stood around Rs 1,400 crore. The an-nouncement of another DA of six will together put the dues of employees towards

the state government at Rs 3,920 crore.

Rejecting the announce-ment, employees associa-tions, including members of the joint action com-mittee of Punjab Civil Sec-retariat Association, said they had been demanding quick implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission; withdrawal of development tax; release of pending DA instalments and at least 50pc of the arrears. Sourc-es said the government in-tended to credit the three pending DA instalments in Provident Fund accounts of employees, along with ar-rears of the new pay scales to be recommended by the Pay Commission.

Indians held in Lanka for staying without visaCOLOMBO: As many as nine Indians have been arrested in Sri Lanka’s Uva province for alleg-edly staying in the coun-try without a visa. The accused, who are most-ly in the their late 20s, were arrested after the police received informa-tion of their illegal stay in the island nation.

The suspects will be produced before the Nu-wara Eliya Magistrate’s Court. In another inci-dent, an Indian national was arrested from the national capital’s Ban-daranaike International Airport with one kg of cocaine worth Rs 15 mil-lion in the international market.

SINGAPORE: An Indian-origin man in Singapore was sentenced to 10 months of jail, along with six strokes of the cane and a fine of 3,000 dollars for attacking a cook at a stall here last year after being asked to pay for the food he ordered. At the court, Murugan Joseph (45) pleaded guilty to five charges, including voluntarily causing hurt with a weapon, possessing a weapon, using insulting words, mischief and theft.

The incident happened last year when jobless Muru-gan and two of his Indian friends went to a food stall and ordered rotis (chapatis). Murugan has also been fined of S$3,000.

Once the food was ready, they were asked to pay by the stall assistant, but he was informed that they did not have any money to pay for the order they placed.

Infuriated that the assistant did not give them any food, Murugan and his friends confronted him for more than 10 minutes, the report quoted the Deputy Public Prosecutor Shenna Tjoa as saying in the court. Following the alterca-tion, Murugan and his friends left the stall but returned again to ask for the food. But they were refused. Hearing the loud argument, the cook, Revi Jose Vibin, stepped in. As the altercation grew, Murugan took a knife and slashed the cook on the left side of his head, leaving a deep cut. Following the incident, the three men were arrested and booked for the crime. A blood sample taken from Muru-gan showed that was intoxicated at the time of the attack.

Indian gets lashes for attacking cookWork permit mandatory for Indians in NepalKATHMANDU: Nepal gov-ernment has made it man-datory for Indian citizens who come to work in Nepal’s industries and other institu-tions to possess necessary work permits. Nepal’s de-partment of labour and occu-pational safety has ordered all its labour offices through-out the country to finalise the actual number of Indian workers working in different sectors in the country.

“While inspecting the institutions the number of Indian workers would be updated and if they don’t have a work permit then in-form the institution to take the work permit is directed hereby,” the letter signed by Prashant Shah, depart-ment’s Industry Inspector states.

CORPORATE NEWS 7Tuesday, February 12, 2019

Union Minister for Corporate Affairs and Finance Piyush Goyal speaking at Industry interaction on “POST-BUDGET 2019” in Mumbai. Chief Minister of Maharashtra Devendra Fadnavis is seen sitting with other dignitaries.

Kerala to manufacture laptopsKerala has become the first state to design and manufacture laptops in the country. Co-conics, which is a public-private partnership (PPP) enterprise, has launched its first range of laptops aimed at government, enterprise and educational institu-tions. The announcement was made on the side-lines of the 2019 edition of Elec-tronics Manufacturing Sum-mit in New Delhi.

Coconics has launched three laptops models. The CC11B is a 2-in-1 notebook featuring a 11-inch FHD touchscreen display, Intel Celeron N3350 processor, 4GB RAM, 64GB eMMC stor-age, USB Type-C connectiv-ity and up to eight hours of battery backup. The laptop is

aimed at frequent travellers.Coconics is a joint ven-

ture of the state-run Keltron, US-based technology firm UST Global, KSIDC and Ac-celeron. It is pitched as a unique public-private lap-top and server manufactur-ing company from Kerala. Meanwhile, Intel has been roped in to provide the guidance and technical as-sistance to manufacture laptops in India under the ‘Make in India’ initiative.

The laptops will be man-ufactured at the state-of-the-art plant in Monvilla, Thiru-vananthapuram. Coconics has a capacity to produce 2,50,000 laptops annually. The manufacturing plant is ready and an official plant inauguration will happen this month. And that’s when

the manufacturing of the laptops will also begin.

Coconics said it plans to distribute the new note-books by the second-quarter of 2019. The prices of lap-tops will depend on how big the order the company re-ceive from the organisation/or educational institutions.

The CC11A is a slim and lightweight notebook aimed at educational institutions. The notebook comes with a 11-inch HD display, Intel Celeron N4000 processor, 2GB RAM and 64GB eMMC storage.

The C314A, a rugged notebook, is aimed at the en-terprise market. It sports a 14-inch HD display and features an Intel i3 7100U processor coupled with 4GB RAM and 500GB HDD storage.

Bharti Axa launches new child insurance planBharti AXA Life Insur-ance has introduced its new child insur-ance plan ‘Bharti AXA Life Shining Stars’, which seeks to provide life cover to par-ents and protects their chil-dren and family from any financial instability.

‘Bharti AXA Life Shining Stars’ is a non-linked, non-participating limited pay endowment life insurance plan that provides assured payouts at maturity and helps parents accumulate sufficient wealth, secure their child’s future and fi-nance his/her higher edu-cational expenses and other life turning points through disciplined savings.

The unique proposition of the new child plan is that it gives parents flexibility to choose between two matu-rity payout options—Flexi Payout Option and Annual Payout Option. This can be chosen at policy inception and modified at the time of maturity as per child’s needs so that the parents are

not constrained by choices that they made years ago.

“Education and career planning of a child are prime responsibilities for any par-ent and they require a pru-dent financial management.

Mere monthly savings might not suffice to meet the ris-ing education costs and the changing needs. Hence, we designed a comprehensive child plan in Bharti AXA Life Shining Stars with twin benefits of savings and pro-tection to help parents en-sure their children’s future financial needs, provide fi-

nancial aid at their different career stages and empower them to fulfill the dreams without any compromise”, Vikas Seth, Managing Direc-tor and Chief Executive Of-ficer, Bharti AXA Life Insur-

ance, said.It comes with an inbuilt

benefit where the policy would continue even af-ter the death of the poli-cyholder with no further premiums to be paid and the maturity benefit would continue to be payable at the time of maturity.

Apart from offering ben-

efits of life cover along with maturity payout, the new child insurance plan also builds a corpus for child’s educational expenses and safeguards his/her future needs, including higher education, career planning and marriage, after the de-mise of the parent, accord-ing to Seth. The minimum age to enter the plan is 18 years and the maximum age to buy it is 60 years.

‘‘Our new child insur-ance plan allows the child to continue uninterrupted education and choose his/her career goal. We are con-fident that Bharti AXA Life Shining Stars will help the new age children shine in the cut-throat environ-ment,’’ he said.

Bharti AXA Life Insur-ance, a joint venture be-tween Bharti Enterprises and French insurance ma-jor AXA, had recorded 52 per cent increase in its new business premium at Rs 398 crore in the first half of fi-nancial year 2018-19.

Tata Steel Q3 profi t up 54pcTata Steel has report-ed a 54.33pc jump in consolidated net profit to Rs 1,753.07 crore during the quarter ended on December 31, 2018, helped by higher income.

The company had posted a net profit of Rs 1,135.92-crore

for the same quarter a year ago, according to a regulatory filing.

Total income on con-solidated basis jumped to Rs 41,431.37 crore during October-December 2018, from Rs 33,672.48 crore in the year-ago quarter, the company said.

Its total expenses dur-ing the said quarter were at Rs 38,362.03 crore as against Rs 30,552.03 crore in the corresponding pe-riod of the previous fiscal.

In a statement, Tata Steel managing director TV Narendran said, “Tata Steel is committed to grow-ing its India footprint while focusing on benchmark operational performance, superior market presence, strong customer relation-

ships and sustainability.”Despite a sharp drop in

international steel prices, the company was able to maintain overall realisa-tions and increased vol-umes significantly in India, he said.

The integration of Tata Steel BSL continues and the company’s 5 MTPA expansion at Tata Steel Ka-linganagar is also making good progress.

“We are also looking for-ward to enhancing our long

products and downstream capability through the ac-quisition of the 1 MTPA steel business of Usha Mar-tin,” Narendran said.

He further said that the phase II review of the Tata Steel Europe-ThyssenK-rupp JV is ongoing and “we are closely working with the European commission to facilitate the same.”

Koushik Chatterjee, ex-ecutive director and CFO of Tata Steel said: “The short-term finance taken for Tata Steel BSL acquisi-tion has been refinanced with long-term loans of Rs 15,500 crore.”

During the quarter un-der review, he said, Tata Steel Group generated op-erating cash flows of Rs 4,150 crore and the liquid-ity position of the group re-mains strong at Rs 19,320 crore, including Rs 8,549 crore of cash and cash equivalents.

On a standalone basis, Tata Steel reported a sharp 83.5pc jump in net profit to Rs 2,456.09 crore in the third quarter of FY2018 from Rs 1,338.09 crore in the year ago quarter.

PMSYM scheme to be in force from Feb 15All unorganised sec-tor workers up to 40 years of age can sub-scribe to the Pradhan Man-tri Shram Yogi Maandhan (PMSYM) scheme, which entails a minimum month-ly pension of Rs 3,000, from February 15, a Labour Min-istry notification said.

The scheme, announced by Finance Minister Piyush Goyal in the Budget for 2019-20, is targeted at un-organised sector workers with monthly income of up to Rs 15,000.

Goyal had said it would benefit 10 crore workers in the next five years.

The scheme would pro-vide them an assured pen-

sion of Rs 3,000 from the age of 60 years on a month-ly contribution of a small amount during their work-ing life.

“This Scheme may be called the Pradhan Man-tri Shram Yogi Maandhan, 2019. It shall come into force on the 15th of Febru-ary, 2019....the unorgan-ised workers have option to become the members of the Scheme, on and from the 15th day of February, 2019,” the notification is-sued by the Labour Minis-try said.

The monthly contribu-tion by the worker joining the scheme would be Rs 55, with matching contribu-

tions from the government.The contributions

would rise at higher age. The worker joining the scheme at the age of 40 years would contribute Rs 200, while workers at the age of 29 years would pay Rs 100.

The scheme will cover unorganised workers who are working or engaged as home based workers, street vendors, mid-day meal workers, head loaders, brick kiln workers, cob-blers, rag pickers, domestic workers, washer men, rick-shaw pullers, landless la-bourers, agricultural work-ers, construction workers, among others.

Voltas to set up plant in Tirupati

Tata group firm Voltas said it will invest over Rs 500 crore to set up a manufacturing fa-cility in Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh.

“This facility will ini-tially manufacture and as-semble air conditioners and related cooling prod-ucts with a total capacity of more than 1 million units to start with,” the company said in a BSE filing.

Voltas said it aims to create technologically ad-vanced products which are expected to start rolling out from the second half of 2020.

The company plans to invest over Rs 500 crore while putting together an OEM (original equipment manufacturer) base for

home appliances, and si-multaneously creating lo-cal employment opportu-nities in the region.

The manufacturing fa-cility, spread over 65 acres, will be one of the first cooling appliances unit in Andhra Pradesh. The choice of Andhra Pradesh as the destination for the new manufacturing unit was due to the state’s ease of doing business and growing focus on ‘Make in India’, it said.

The chosen location provides dual benefits of superior market access and cost effective connectivity via road and port, it add-ed. Voltas will cater to the south, west and east mar-kets through this manufac-turing facility.

Max Financial Q3 profi t at Rs 140 crMax Financial Ser-vices reported a rise of 41pc in standalone net profit at Rs 139.89 crore for the third quarter ended December 31, 2018.

The company’s net prof-

it stood at Rs 99.45 crore in the year-ago quarter.

During September quar-ter 2018-19, the company reported a net loss of Rs 56.33 crore.

Total income during the latest quarter rose to Rs

176.57 crore as against Rs 131.43 crore in the same period of the preceding fis-cal, the company said in a regulatory filing.

Consolidated figures were not given by the com-pany.

Dur ing the latest q u a r t e r , Max Fi-n a n c i a l a c q u i r e d

14,170,817 shares of its subsidiary Max Life Insur-ance Co Ltd(MLIC), from Axis Bank for Rs 162.96 crore, thereby increas-ing its stake in MLIC from 70.75 per cent to 71.49pc, it said in the filing.

India offers 23 oil blocks in OALP-III bid roundIndia offered 23 oil and gas and CBM blocks for bidding in the third round of Open Acreage Li-censing Policy, expecting up to $ 700 million of in-vestment that it hoped will help raise domestic output and cut imports.

Oil Minister Dharmen-dra Pradhan launched the OALP-III bid round at the Petrotech 2019 conference on the outskirts of Delhi.

“In OALP-III, 23 blocks in 12 sedimentary basins are being offered. Of these

five are coal-bed methane (CBM) blocks. Total area on offer is about 31,000 square kilometers,” he said.

Last date for bidding is April 10.

OALP-III will run con-currently with OALP-II, where 14 blocks covering an area of close to 30,000 sq km is on offer for bid-ding, he said, adding that in OALP-I, 55 blocks cov-ering an area of 60,000 sq km were offered in January 2018 and awarded in Octo-ber last year.

“In one year, we have added about ?1.2 lakh sq km of area to exploration kitty. This compares to 90,000 sq km area under exploration previously,” he said, adding the area under exploration will double by the time the round ends.

“Our effort is to acceler-ate exploration of all sedi-mentary basins of the coun-try,” he said.

The third round is ex-pected to “generate im-mediate exploration work commitment of around

$ 600-700 million,” a state-ment issued at the launch

said.In the first round of

OALP last year, as much as Rs 60,000 crore was com-

mitted in the exploration of oil and gas in 55 blocks or

areas.The 14 blocks being of-

fered in OALP-II bid rounds cover an area of 29,333 square kilometers, and bids close on March 12 and an-other Rs 40,000 crore in-vestment is expected.

Since the BJP-led NDA came to power in 2014, the government has held two auctions of discovered small fields and a similar number under OALP and the cumulative investment committed is Rs 1,20,000 crore, officials said.

India had in July 2017 allowed companies to carve out blocks of their choice with a view to bringing about 2.8 million sq km of unexplored area in the country under exploration.

Under OALP, companies are allowed to put in an ex-pression of interest (EoI) for prospecting of oil and gas in an area that is presently not under any production or exploration licence. EoIs can be put in at any time of the year but they are accu-mulated twice annually.

8 Travel / Entertainment

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Iconic Boeing 747 completes 50 years

US President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump walk down the tarmac after step-ping off Air Force One (Boeing 747 aircraft) during their foreign trip.

Joe Sutter headed the design team and known as the “Father of the 747”.

February 9, 2019, marked 50 years to the day that the first Boeing 747 went airborne over the US ---- the result of the work of 50,000 em-ployees. It was the larg-est civilian aircraft in the world and required the world’s largest building (by volume) at the time, for its assembly plant in Everett, near Washington.

Led by chief executive William Allen and head of the design team Joe Sutter, Boeing was seen as taking a risk on the mechanics and finances involved in getting the 747 off the ground. With the Boeing 707, the US’ first commercial jetliner, already in service and demand for air travel growing, an agree-ment was reached in 1966 with Pan American Airways to purchase a larger model if it was to be built.

By Sept 1968, the first assembled 747 rolled out of the plant with its dis-tinctive hump and with a number of aviation firsts including its twin-aisle wide body design.”It did not take long for the 747 to have a giant impact on air travel,” says Boeing senior

corporate historian Michael Lombardi.

“It was the must-have flagship for the world’s air-lines and attracted passen-gers with its luxury and

passenger appeal. But it was the super jet’s size, world-spanning range, capacity and economy that had the greatest impact, making it possible for all of humanity to fly and with that the 747 will forever mark the point in history when any person on planet earth could fly anywhere on the globe.”

It took fewer than two years from the 747’s first test flight for one million pas-sengers to have flown on the model after it entered service in Jan 1970. And it wasn’t

just the passengers that were benefitting. Its final design was offered in three con-figurations ---- all passenger, all cargo and a convertible passenger/freighter model. The cargo containers were loaded through the nose, while there was room for 3,400 pieces of baggage.

New versions of the air-

craft continued to be cre-ated -- the 747-200 model in 1971, the 747-300 in 1980 and the 747-400 in 1988. In 1990, two 747-200Bs were modified to serve as Air

Force One and replaced the VC-137s (707s) that served as the presidential aircraft for nearly 30 years. The US government still uses the 747 for Air Force One and it announced that it will con-tinue the tradition by order-ing the 747-8 to replace the two 747-200s in the current fleet. These are not expected

to come into service until 2024. Trump confirmed the new planes will be painted “red, white and blue, which I think is appropriate”.

The special capabilities

of his current ride include a longer travel range and aerial refueling while the customi-sation on board has given it offices and a conference and dining room. It hasn’t just been America’s leadership utilising the 747, however.

The 747, meanwhile, is far from obsolete although production is now mainly

focused on the freighter version of the 747-8 and it has been overtaken in the rankings for deliveries by the 777. As Lombardi at Boeing sums up: “Over the

last 50 years, the 747 has be-come legendary and today it is a bridge to a romantic era of flight, an era that we should continue to aspire to resurrect. But more than that the 747 is a reminder of the power of the human spirit and what we can ac-complish with our hearts, minds and hard work...”

Food aficionados have another reason to go to Dubai as the total number of restaurants and cafes in this global city has reached 11,813 at the end of 2018. More