- Thursday, March 06, 2025
By: Shubham Ghosh
Here are news in brief related to Indian economy and business for Tuesday, December 6, 2022:
The Indian rupee has fared relatively well in 2022 in comparison to other emerging market peers, senior World Bank economist Dhruv Sharma said Tuesday after the global financial body revised India’s gross domestic product forecast to 6.9 per cent, Asian News International reported. “The rupee has depreciated just about 10 per cent over the course of this year. That might sound like a large number, but relative to many other emerging market peers, India hasn’t fared that badly,” Sharma told a press briefing during the day after the launch of the World Bank’s India Development Update titled “Navigating the Storm”. For the record, the rupee has come substantially off its all-time low. Currently, it is trading around 82.0 against the US dollar as against a record low of 83 it breached in mid-October.
India’s ambassador to the US Taranjit Singh Sandhu on Monday (5) met Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in Seattle during which they discussed the software giant’s work in India including in education, technology, healthcare and entrepreneurship sectors, Press Trust of India reported. In October, Nadella, 55, was presented with the prestigious Padma Bhushan by India’s Consul General in San Francisco, Dr TV Nagendra Prasad. The CEO of Microsoft was named one of 17 awardees earlier this year. “Discussed Microsoft’s work in India including in skilling, education, technology, healthcare and entrepreneurship sectors,” Sandhu said in a tweet following his meeting with Nadella at the Microsoft’s headquarters in Seattle.
India has distinguished itself as it has successfully used space technology for bringing ease of living for the common citizens by working in different sectors like railways, smart cities, roads and buildings, highways, digital health, telemedicine, the country’s minister of state for science and technology Jitendra Singh said on Tuesday, ANI reported. Global challenges need to be fought through global collaboration, regardless of our respective ideologies or individual leanings, the minister added. While attending the ministerial plenary in Abu Dhabi, UAE, on ‘Role of Foreign Policy in Enabling Space Diplomacy and International Cooperation’, Singh said the space debate has brought all of us together to think about the well-being of the Earth. Top ministers from the UAE, Bahrain, and Israel were also present at the event.
Indian finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday chaired a meeting to improve the efficiency of the Development Action Plan for Scheduled Tribes and Scheduled Tribe Component fund utilisation, ANI reported. India’s tribal affairs minister Arjun Munda and minister of state for tribal affairs Renuka Singh were also present during the meeting. NITI Aayog CEO Parameswaran Iyer, finance secretary TV Somanathan, secretaries of the department of drinking water and sanitation, ministry of tribal affairs, ministry of women and child development, department of telecommunications, department of food and public distribution, ministry of rural development, ministry of health, ministry of HRD, department of fertilisers and ministry of development of North Eastern Region, were present in the meeting.
Google’s Jigsaw subsidiary is starting a new anti-misinformation project in India to prevent misleading information that has been blamed for inciting violence, Reuters reported citing a top executive as saying. The initiative will use “prebunking” videos that have been designed to combat false claims before they become widespread and circulated on the company’s YouTube platform and other social media channels. Google’s efforts to challenge the spread of misinformation are in start contrast with rival Twitter which is slashing its trust and safety teams, despite new owner Elon Musk claiming it will not become a “free-for-all hellscape”.
In line with the government’s thrust on zero-budget farming, Indian farmers have brought an additional 4.78 lakh (0.478 million) hectares area under natural farming covering 17 states last year, ANI reported. To promote natural farming, the central government has approved the National Mission on Natural Farming as a separate scheme with an expenditure of Rs 1,584 crore (£158 million), said Indian agriculture minister Narendra Singh Tomar while addressing the National Conference on Soil Health Management for Sustainable Farming on Monday.
