Income tax return (ITR) exemptionlimit: Middle Class taxpayers may get a very huge relief by Finance MinisterNirmala Sitharaman as Modi govt is expected to increase the basic exemption limit from 2.5 lakh to 5lakh & standard deduction from 50000 to 100000.
This will relive a large segment of middle class direct tax payer and put more money in their hand which inturn will lead to higher savings and creating more immovable assets.This step if taken will also help affordable housing sector of realestate.As per reliable sources Finnace ministry officials are working regoriously to find out the actual no of middle class direct tax payers(expected around 2.5cr to 4cr)who will fall out and have zero tax liability.
Govt is working out in it as a part of atmanirbhar Bharat initiative to help middle class segment of India to recover from covid 19 pandamic economic effect quickly. Further in budget 2020 basic exemption limit was kept unchanged for all opting for old tax slabs and for those opting for new tax slabs standard deduction is not applicable.In 2018-19 medical reimbursement and travel allowance was also removed from standard deduction. Overall since last few years there was no benefit for middle class segment direct tax part.So govt is working out to relieve a large segment of direct tax payer in this year budget season.
The much awaited TataSUV is back in the game. Today Tata Motors officially announced and rolled out its old guard SAFARI to boost its above 4 meters Sports Utility Vehicle segment by launching the all new TataSafari 2021. The vehicle’s look is completely new & Tata Motors promises more power in its engine than previous one. The expected price of this vehicle shall start from approx 13 lakh and the two variants will cost around 22 lakh.
The mother of all battles that shaped the future of the world & reversed the course of World War-II.
The whole war drama in the eastern front unfolded on 22nd June 1941 when two nations having friendly terms and non aggression pact turned arch foes. It was Nazi Germany who kept all treaties and pacts on the edge of its heels and launched human history’s largest land conquest campaign called Operation Barbarosa to conquer the largest country in the world the Soviet Union. With their blitzkrieg (lightening war) & scorch earth strategy Nazi army roared across Soviet territory achieving victories after victories. Thanks to Joseph Stalin’s great purge of 1937 & miscalculation of German friendly treaties Soviet military structure collapsed in front of fast moving German onslaught. It seemed that Hitler was right about Soviet Union that they are a rotten system we just need to kick on its door & the whole system will fall like a house of cards. Within 4 months from attack Nazi troops reached Moscow the Soviet capital even Stalin saw German troops from Kremlin top.
But Hitler had other ideas in mind that were to reach quickly to southern oil rich region of Soviet Union and on its way conquer the city of Stalingrad a major industrial hub and pride of Stalin. Hitler wanted to capture and destroy this city to destroy the morale of soviets and Stalin wanted to defend the city to boost the already shattered Soviet morale as his name was associated with the city. The German mayhem upon Stalingrad started in august 1942 and the whole city was brought to ground by heavy ariel bombardment. But with nothing to lose Soviets held their ground & even citizens came forward to defend their city. By November the whole battle turned into an urban Guerilla war. Soviets were determined to stop the Germans which led to severe house to house pitch battle. But Soviets had different plans. They were planning to encircle Germans by cutting off their supply line as it was hugely stretched and was guarded by weak German allies like Italy, Hungary & Romanian army at their flanks.
On 19th November 1941 operation Uranus was launched & thousands of Soviet artillery, katyusha rockets poured upon the non German axis segments protecting the German flanks and quickly decimated them & by 23rd November encirclement was completed effectively cutting off the whole German 6th army division consisting of over 4lakh men.
For the next three months Germans tried desperately to break through the encirclement & the Soviets gave all they got to hold the encirclement. Both Hitler & Stalin ordered strict laws to get over each other. Hitler ordered to stand till last bullet till last men & Stalin ordered the famous order no 227 not a step back: generals were ordered to shoot anyone who tried to retreat.
Finally the German 6th army under Friedrich Paulus surrendered on 2nd February 1943 violating Hitler’s order & brought an end to the bloodshed at Stalingrad.
Just two days ahead of presidential electionsUganda government banned social media and messaging apps on Tuesday. The government had made it clear to the executives of the telecom companies that this ban is in retaliation to Facebook which had blocked some pro government accounts.
In today’s era social media plays a very crucial role during elections as we have witnessed in case of India and the US. The International Press Institute, a global watchdog, said in a statement that Any efforts to block online access to journalists or members of the public are unacceptable breaches of the right to information.
On Monday, Facebook had shut down several accounts linked to the country’s Ministry of Information, citing reason that it was orchestrating numerous fake and duplicate accounts to promote the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party and the President Yoweri Museveni, one of Africa’s longest serving leaders.
The opposition frontrunner Bobi Wine, a popular singer about half the age of President Yoweri Museveni, has been using Facebook to relay live coverage of his campaigns and conferences. He accused that since most radio and TV stations are owned by government and Uganda’s leading daily is also state run many media outlets had declined to host him. Is is noteworthy that Bobi Wine had tweeted on Tuesday “The army has this morning raided my home, arrested all my security guards and anyone they could see around my premises”.
Finally the wait is over and the world renowned company owned by world’s second richest man Elon Musk is ready to enter India. According to a Registrar of Companies it has filed for a new entity Tesla India Motors and energy Private Limited . It is reported thatTesla has registered itself as a Company in Bengaluru with its registered office in Lavelle Road.
Vaibhav Taneja, Venkatrangam Sreeram and David Jon Feinstein are listed as Directors of the newly formed company. As per the ROC of the Ministry of corporate Affairs the company has been incorporated as a Subsidiary of foreign Company which could be Tesla Inc.
It is also reported that the company will first launch its fully electric Model 3 Sedan in the country which would be priced around Rs 60 lacs. Earlier in October 2020 Elon Musk himself had said in response to a question by Tesla Club India if there is an India team working on the next year for sure scheduled Tesla entry that the process to bring Tesla cars to India would begin in January 2021.
In December Nitin Gadkari, the union Minister for road Transport and Highways confirmed that Tesla is coming to India but will first start off with sales and then look at assembly and manufacturing based on the response it receives.
Recently Elon Musk gained first spot on Forbes World’s Richest list but soon slipped to second position behind Amazon CEO Jeff Bezoz.
Hurun released its list of 500 most valuable not state controlled companies across the globe on Tuesday. The ranking which is released in association with Chinese luxury tea branch Empereur is based on value. For listed companies it is based on market capitalization & for non listed companies on valuation. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic Hurun global 500 rose by 25 percent. 60 companies amongst the list have doubled in terms of their value with 25 being from the US and 21 from China. The total value of Hurun 500 is equivalent to the combined GDPs of world’s six largest economies viz. the US, China, Japan, Germany, India & the UK, i.e. $50 trillion.
The top 10 Players
The US accounted for nearly half of the list with 242 companies followed by China with 51 companies & Japan with 30 companies. From valuation gains perspective China leads with a 73 percent increase by its top companies during the despite being hit by the Pandemic in the very start. The top companies form the list are:
Apple (USD 2.1 trillion)
Microsoft and Amazon (USD 1.6 trillion)
Alphabet (USD 1.2 trillion)
followed by Facebook, Tencent Holdings, Alibaba, Berkshire Hathway, Tesla and Visa.
Indian companies amongst the list:
India’s richest manMukesh Ambani led Reliance Industries leads among Indian Enterprises with a valuation of USD 168.8 billion and ranks 54 globally. It is followed by Tata Consultancy Services with valuation USD 139 billion & ranking 73rd globally. the other companies being HDFC Bank, Hindustan Lever, Infosys, HDFC ltd, Kotak Mahindra Bank, ICICI Bank, ITC,
With 11 Indian companies in the Hurun 500 list India ranked 10th in the list as per report. The total value of these 11 companies grew 14 percent to approximately 805 billion or nearly one third of the GDP of India. As per the report the local stock market grew 12 percent despite being hit by the Pandemic which explains the rise in their valuations.
What is HurunReport
Hurun Report is a private company that produces research and reports best known for Hurun Rich List. It is owned by Rupert Hoogewerf, also known by his Chinese name Hu Run who is widely regarded as an influential opinion former in china.
Every year 12 th of January is celebrated as national youth day in our country. It is celebrated to commemorate the birth anniversary of great Swami Vivekananda, our very own Patriotic Saint, i.e 12th January 1863.In 1984 Govt of India decided to celebrate the birthday of Swami Vivekananda as National Youth Day & since 1985 every year 12th January is celebrated as national youth day throughout India. On this day various debates,discussion & other activities are organized to motivate youth especially in school, colleges,etc.
Who is Swami Vivekananda?
Swami Vivekananda who is best known for his groundbreaking speech to the World’s Parliament of Religions (1983) in which he introduced Hinduism to America and called for religious tolerance and an end to fanaticism. This speech given by the Indian monk in Chicago and his efforts to raise interfaith awareness are still very significant in our current Era especially when so much radicalization is prevalent.
Born as Narendranath Dutta, his childhood name, he played a key role in introduction of Indian philosophies of Vedanta and Yoga to the western world.
While completing his education he was a very bright student & known for his prodigious memory & the ability at speed reading giving him name Shrutidhara(a person with prodigious memory).
Gradually Narendra grew ready to renounce everything for the sake for the realization of God, and accepted Ramakrishna Paramhansa as his Guru.
On 4th July 1902 at the age of 39, Swami Vivekananda fulfilled his prophecy that he would not live forty years & died. At 7:00 pm Vivekananda went to his room, & instructed everyone not to disturb him. Later at 9;20 p.m. he died while meditating. Cause of his death was reported as the rupture of a blood vessel in his brain possibly. According to his disciples, he attained Mahasamadhi and the rupture was due to his Brahmarandhra(an opening in the crown of head) being pierced when he attained Mahasamadhi.
A theme is decided every year for National Youth Day celebration. This theme is decided every year by a high level committee from Ram Krishna mission. Theme for National Youth Day 2021 is YUVAAH-‘Utsah naye bharat ka’ it means the youth bring alive the celebration of new India.
On this National Youth Day we can only hope & pray that though he is not with us but his legacy will remain with all Indians and the World always.
Team India captainVirat Kohli and his wife actress Anushka Sharma had announced that they were expecting a baby in August 2020 and due date for the baby being January 2021. Today Virat Kohli announced on his instagram account that the couple have been blessed with a baby girl.
Virat Kohli and Anushka Sharma popularly known as Virushka got married on 11th December 2017. On the work front Anushka Sharma who is a few months elder than her husband Virat Kohli had produced hit web series Patal Lok and Bulbul recently. While Kohli had taken Paternity leave and returned to India after Team India’s first Test against Australia.
Name and photos of the baby girl are yet to be out and the couple had requested people to respect their privacy.
On the occasion of death Anniversary of our former Prime Minister Late Sri Lal Bahadur Shastri, the fact that mystery of his death is still unresolved is deeply saddening. Despite being a Prime Minister it is hard to believe that nobody knows how he died and a country like India that aspires to become World Power chicken out about the death of its former Prime Minister even today.
Who is Lal Bahadur Shastri:
Late Sri Lal bahadur Shastri was the second Prime Minister of India. He had played a great role in promoting White Revolution & Green Revolution in India. His original surname was Srivastava. He was highly influenced by thoughts of Mahatma Gandhi, Swami Vivekanand and Annie Besant that is why he dropped his caste derived surname from his name. He led the country during the Indo-Pakistan War of 1965 and gave the slogan “Jai Jawan Jai Kisan”. Famous Actor and Director Manoj Kumar has produced his super hit movie “Upkar” based on this very slogan.
The Death Controversy
Just one day after signing a peace treaty to end the 1965 Indo-Pakistan War Shastri Ji died in Tashkent, Uzbekistan(then soviet Union) on 11th January 1966. Conspiracy theories started to appear within hours of his death and still persist as we have got no proper explanation or reason for his death. Most people at that time, and since, allege foul play regarding his death.
There are several reasons that suggest that something is not right about his death and some conspiracies do exist.
The media at that time kept silence and the government also did not release any information about his death. People tried to file RTI to gain information regarding his death but in vain.
Anuj Dhar, author of CIAs Eye on South Asia, posed a query under Right to Information Act to declassify a document supposedly related to Shastri’s death, but the Prime Minister’s Office declined the same reportedly citing that this could lead to harming of foreign relations, cause disruption in the country and breach of parliamentary privileges.
Another RTI was filed by Kuldip Nayar but it was also declined by PMO citing exemption from disclosure on the plea. No response has been received even yet about whether India had conducted post-mortem on Shastri Ji and if the government had investigated alleged foul play.
In reply to an RTI the Delhi Police said that they do not have any record pertaining Shastri’s death. The replay dated 29th July said “No such record related to the death of former Prime Minister of India Lal Bahadur Shastri is available in this district. Hence the requisite information pertaining to New Delhi district may please be treated as nil”.
The Ministry of External Affair had said that no post mortem was conducted in the USSR.
All these facts create suspicion about Shastri’s death and since then many conspiracy theories have emerged which involved role of either Soviet Union or United States of America.
The Soviet Union conspiracy theory
The discussions between Indian and Pakistani delegations virtually ended in a stalemate and till the late afternoon hours of 9 January 1966 it seemed that there would be no agreement between the two sides. Sensing that, many of the journalists went shopping. Suddenly, they were alerted that an agreement was imminent and would be signed between the two leaders at about 4.30 in the evening. Many journalists have raised the issue that Shastri who so far stood like a rock, unwilling to give up, looked a bit shaken at the agreement-signing ceremony. So what actually happened in the few hours that compelled Shastri to change his stance? If he was under tremendous pressure to accede to Pakistani demands then who created such pressures? And Shastri who maintained his composure, his determination for so long when it had become almost certain that there will be no agreement, under whose pressure made him give in?
The role of KGB behind Shastri’s death too has been conjectured by many. It is believed that T N Kaul, the then Indian Ambassador to the Soviet Union, was very close to the Soviets, his role behind the agreement and his silence even after Shastri’s death, is bound to raise some uncomfortable questions.
From the Soviet perspective, US was expanding its geopolitical influence in Asia. Pakistan had become an American ally and some reports suggested that they had allowed a secret base at Peshawar to be used by the USAF’s U2 spy planes that were deployed for surveillance of Soviet nuclear facilities, space research, and other secret works mostly done in Central Asia.
The Soviet Union as a means to please Pakistan took its side forcing India to accede to its request to that Pakistan could return the favor to them later on. Many journalists claim that they witnessed the amount of persuasion, insistence and implicit pressure was exerted on then Indian Foreign Minister Swaran Singh and probably Shastri by then Soviet PM Kosygin who was supposed to be mediating between India and Pakistan.
Following the Tashkent Treaty signed between Indian PM Shastri and Pakistani President General Ayub Khan on January 10, 1966, in the presence of the then Soviet PM Kosygin, the death of the PM Shastri the same night did raise many questions that remain unanswered even after almost 55 years.
The US conspiracy theory
Gregory Douglas, a journalists who interviewed former CIA operative Robert Crowley for more than 4 years recorded their telephone conversations. He published a transcription in his book titled Conversations with the Crow in which he claim that the CIA was responsible for eliminating Homi Jahangir Bhabha, an Indian nuclear scientist whose plane crashed in the Alps, when he was going to attend a conference in Vienna; and Lal Bahadur Shastri.
Crowley said that the USA was not happy with India’s rigid stand on nuclear policy of then prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri who wanted to go ahead with nuclear tests. He also said that the agency was worried about collective domination by India and Russia over the region, for which they required a strong deterrent.
Its still not clear as to who was responsible for Shastri’s death but the circumstances under which he died and the incidents afterwards where his personal physician and assistant died under mysterious circumstances in New Delhi and the fact that stil no proper investigation has been carried out ever and the government of India is reluctant to share any information regarding it create concrete suspicion. As of now all we know is that just like the disappearance of Netaji subhash Chandra Bose or the death of former US President JF Kennedy, Shastri’s death also remains a mystry that has not been solved and might never be solved.
Since our childhood we have been celebrating Rashtriya Hindi Diwas on 14th of September every year but now a days we celebrate Vishwa Hindi Diwas also on 10th of January. Let us know the difference between National Hindi Day and World Hindi Day as Why Hindi Diwas is celebrated, who started the celebration of Hindi Day and since when Rashtriya Hindi Diwas and Vishwa Hindi Diwas are being celebrated.
World Hindi Day was started by then Prime Minister Sri Manmohan Singh in 2006 to commemorate first anniversary of World Hindi Conference that took place in 1975 in Nagpur Maharashtra. It was inaugurated by the then Prime Minister of India, Smt Indira Gandhi. The chief guest of the first conference was Mauritius Prime Minister Seewoosagur Ramgoolam. It was attended by 122 delegates from 30 countries.
National Hindi Diwas is observed on 14th September every year to commemorate the day the Constituent Assembly adopted Hindi as our Official Language. Our great writer Beohar Rajendra Simha along with Kaka Kalelkar, Maithilisharan Gupt, Hajariprasad Dvivedi, Seth Govinddas played an important role in making hindi our official language. To mark the cognizance of Beohar Rajendra Singh celebration of National Hindi Day started from 14th September 1949 which happens to be the birthday of Jabalpur born writer.
The basic aim of observing World Hindi day is to promote Hindi language worldwide. It is celebrated all over the world specially in school, colleges by organising cultural programs where people make Hindi Diwas posters, giving Hindi Day quotes and Hindi Day speeches. Our Prime Minister Sri Narendra Modi often address in Hindi on World Platform. Late Prime Minister Sri Atal Bihari Vajpayee also gave speech in United Nations in hindi.
Rajbhasha awards are conferred upon the ministries, departments, PSUs and Nationalised banks. Ministry of Home Affairs in its order dated 25 March 2015 changed the names of two awards ‘Indira Gandhi Rajbhasha Puruskaar’ to ‘Rajbhasha Kirti Puruskaar’ and ‘Rajiv Gandhi Rashtriya Gyan-Vigyan Maulik Pustak Lekhan Puruskaar’ to ‘Rajbhasha Gaurav Puruskar’ .
