Government modifies Atal Pension Yojna to widen reach

Prime Minister Narendra Modi

"To increase the acceptability of the scheme amongst informal sector workers, the government has modified the APY. The individual subscribers shall have an option to make the contribution on a monthly, quarterly or half yearly basis instead of on a monthly basis earlier," the Finance Ministry said in a statement.

The APY was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Kolkata on May 9, 2015.    Under the scheme, the subscriber, who must be in the age group of 18-40 years, would receive the fixed pension in the range Rs 1,000-Rs 5,000 per month after attaining the age of 60 years, depending on contribution which would vary at the age of joining. http://post.jagran.com/government-modifies-atal-pension-yojna-to-widen-reach-1440070995

Source: India News

India-Africa Summit to begin from October 26 in New Delhi

The five day-long third "India-Africa Summit" is expected to be attended by nearly 1000 delegates including Heads of Government, Ministers, government officials, business leaders
and others.

While the meeting between the Heads of the Government and States will take place on October 29, it will be preceded by the rounds of interactions between the ministers and the senior officials.

On October 30, bilateral meetings are being scheduled, Navtej Sarna, Secretary (West), said  here.

When asked how many confirmations the government has received, he informed invitations were being sent out at three levels Head of the Government, Foreign Minister and Senior officials- and responses will come thereafter.

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Government assures relief for rain hit farmers

Acknowledging the unanimous voice on the issue, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said the government would act "with  compassion and without going into technicalities" of the matter.

Jaitley added the government has full sympathy with the farmers in this hour of natural crisis and the Centre would take all possible steps.

Finance Minister informed the House that the Agriculture Minister has constituted separate teams for each state to assess the losses and all the three Ministers have started visiting the affected states from Thursday.

His remarks came after Opposition Congress, BSP, JD-U and CPI(M) demanded that the Centre should immediately announce financial assistance, assess the extent of damage to crops and
wave interest on loans of distressed farmers.

K C Tyagi (JD-U), who initiated the discussion, said though crops worth Rs 22,000 crore has been lost in the natural fury, the insurance companies were assessing crop loss at no more than Rs 1,000 crore.

Former Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar (NCP) spoke at length on the damage to crops from drought, unseasonal rain and hailstorm and asked Centre to chip in with more help and waive short-term loans particularly crop loan as well as the interest on loans for purchase of agriculture equipments.

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Sharp rise in bad loans; banks taking action: Government

"It is normal for the banks to have 2-3 per cent of NPA (Non-Performing Assets). But in the last 2-3 years the NPA has been increased substantially and gone up to 6 per cent... Stress assets have also been increased," he said during the Question Hour.
 
Jaitley said actions against those who have failed to repay the loan amount have been initiated under various provisions of law - including under Indian Penal Code and and civil laws.
 
To a question on action taken against promoters of Kingfisher Airlines for having huge outstanding loans, he said banks are dealing with all defaulters as per law and actions have been taken that include declaring the promoters and directors as willful defaulters that barred them to obtain loan from any bank in future and auction mortgaged property.
 
Jaitley said there are people and companies who are under stress due to the economic slow down in last 2-3 years and in such cases banks allow the companies to restructure the loan repayment process to give them relief.
 
He, however, said, there are people and companies whose intention is not good and who do not want to repay the outstanding amount to banks. In such cases, the banks take proper action as per law.
 
The minister said the SEBI Act has been amended recently with tough provisions and steps are being taken against those companies which cheat people in the name of chit funds.   

Under the amended law, the state governments can take action against those who cheat people while collecting money in the name of chit fund.
 
Police has full right to take action and many people are in jail for such crime," he said.

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Government to put in place system to track movement of containers

Different departments and ministries including the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) and the Shipping Ministry are in the process of finalising the project, conceptualised by Japan-based NEC Corporation.
  
"It will provide near to real time tracking of containers across the complete logistics value chain by way of integrating the software of different service providers and tracking of containers through installation of Radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags," a senior official said.
  
Regulatory framework for charging mandatory user charges has been deliberated with the Shipping Ministry, the official said.
  
The LDB would address the issue of tracking and viewing the movement of containers across the ports to the Inland Container Depot (ICDs) and end users.
  
"The LDB would be an overarching solution that will integrate the information available with various agencies across the supply chain to provide detailed real time information within a single window," the official added.
  
It would also enable the centre, states, importers, exporters and other stakeholders to assess comparative performance, identify inefficiencies and bottlenecks to develop strategies to ensure the development of the sector.
  
Reduction in the lead time and transaction cost as a result of predictability and optimisation achieved through LDB would attract companies to set up or open new centres in the DMIC zone.

Almost 60 percent of the container traffic currently in India is in the Western Corridor.

With the establishment of new DMIC cities and the expected increase in container traffic, it is more essential to provide a world class logistic infrastructure to the operating entities to boost the manufacturing and other related sectors, the official added.
  
The project would be first implemented at Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT).
  
"The proposal has been submitted to the JNPT for onward submission to Tariff Authority of Major Ports (TAMP) after getting comments from private terminal operators. Meeting for considering the notification of mandatory user charges for the LDB project is scheduled on October 29," the official said.

Source:Latest Newsfrom State News

 

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