Portrait News

Remembering former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi on his 29th death anniversary, PM Modi pays tribute May 21 marks a sad day in the history of Indian politics. A day that will never be forgotten. On this day, twenty-nine years back, former prime minister and stalwart Congress leader Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated during an election campaign in the year 1991. As the nation remembers Gandhi on his 29th death anniversary today, here’s revisiting the life of the Bharat Ratna recipient. Rajiv Ratna Gandhi was born on August 20, 1944, in Bombay, to former prime minister Indira Gandhi and freedom fighter, politician...

Harsh Vardhan is India’s nominee for lead role in WHO, takes over on Friday Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, who is leading the country’s battle against Covid-19 in the country, will be India’s nominee to be the next WHO Executive Board chairman, people familiar with the development told Hindustan Times. A senior government official said the health minister would be elected at the World Health Organisation‘s Executive Board’s meeting on 22 May. The election is a procedural formality. “It is not a full time assignment… But Dr Harsh Vardhan will be required to chair the executive board’s bi-annual meetings,” a senior government official told Hindustan Times....

US should end reliance on China: Nikki Haley The coronavirus pandemic has underscored the need for the United States to move away from its reliance on communist China, Indian American Republican politician Nikki Haley said on Tuesday. “While Beijing has abused the free market in order to destroy it, America must harness the free market to protect our freedom and national security,” Haley, a former Governor of South Carolina and US Ambassador to the United Nations said in an op-ed on Medium. The United States, she said, should start by setting up stronger guardrails to prevent China from exploiting America’s...

World Bank says Covid-19 to push 60 mn into poverty; announces $160 bn assistance to 100 countries WASHINGTON: The coronavirus pandemic is expected to put over 60 million people into extreme poverty globally, the World Bank has said as it announced emergency operations worth USD 160 billion in 100 developing countries to fight the deadly virus. “The pandemic and shutdown of advanced economies could push as many as 60 million people into extreme poverty — erasing much of the recent progress made in poverty alleviation,” World Bank President David Malpass told reporters during a conference call on Tuesday. “The World...

TCS CEO salary package cut by 16% to ₹13.3 crore in FY20 Pay package of Tata Consultancy Services CEO and MD Rajesh Gopinathan shrank more than 16 per cent to ₹13.3 crore in 2019-20 compared to the previous fiscal, according to the company’s annual report. In 2018-19, Gopinathan had received a total remuneration of ₹16.02 crore. According to TCS’ annual report for 2019-20, Gopinathan received ₹1.35 crore in salary, ₹1.29 crore in perquisites, ₹10 crore in commission (at 0.02 per cent of profit) and ₹72.82 lakh in allowances. Source: Livemint

Return of ‘Flop Show’ on Doordarshan emotional: Savita Bhatti Veteran actor-producer Savita Bhatti on Wednesday said she feels “rejuvenated” after Doordarshan announced the re-run of “Flop Show”, the satirical sitcom which is an intrinsic part of her identity. “Flop Show”, created and directed by Savita Bhatti’s co-star and late husband, satirist Jaspal Bhatti, joins the long list of DD’s iconic old shows such as “Ramayan”, “Mahabharat”, “Buniyaad”, “Shaktimaan”, among others to make a come back on the small screen amid the coronavirus-led lockdown. On Monday, the national broadcaster revealed that it was bringing back the serial, which first aired in...

New York City Could Begin Some Re-opening Only Around ‘First Half of June’, Says Mayor de Blasio New York City, hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, is still weeks away from a phased reopening by the first half of June, Mayor Bill de Blasio has said, as authorities are trying to meet all the seven health-related measures necessary for such a step. New York City, the epicenter of the Covid-19 pandemic in the US, has 191,073 coronavirus cases and 15,983 confirmed Covid-19 deaths, which are deaths following positive Covid-19 laboratory tests. “There’s no way we’re getting to the City and...

Donald Trump’s use of malaria drug to prevent Covid is a boost for India US President Donald Trump’s declaration that he was taking an antimalarial drug of dubious effectiveness to help fend off the coronavirus will likely be welcomed in India. Trump’s previous endorsement of hydroxychloroquine catalyzed a tremendous shift in the South Asian country, spurring the world’s largest producer of the drug to make much more of it, prescribe it for front-line health workers treating the virus and deploy it as a diplomatic tool, despite mounting evidence against using the drug for COVID-19. Trump said Monday that he was taking hydroxychloroquine as...

Jio Can Help Advance India as Global Tech Leader: General Atlantic’s Sandeep Naik Yesterday, noted American investment firm General Atlantic picked up a 1.34 percent stake in Jio Platforms, the holding company of Reliance Jio — the largest telecom operator of India. The investment of Rs 6,598.38 crore comes on the back of similarly sizeable investments by Silver Lake (Rs 5,655.75 crore for 1.15 percent), Vista Equity Partners (Rs 11,367 crore for 2.3 percent) and the world’s largest social media corporation, Facebook (Rs 43,574 crore for 9.99 percent). With total assets of Rs 2.57 lakh crore under management across numerous...

Ilaiyaraaja’s tech-savvy drummer, R. Purusothaman, dies R. Purusothaman, the drummer and conductor of maestro Ilayaraja, died here on Tuesday. “He died of blood cancer,” said his elder brother and guitarist R. Chandrasekar. He was 70 and is survived by two sons. Purusothaman, Purus as he was known in the film world, and Mr. Chandrasekar, started working for Ilayaraja from the maestro’s first film Annakili. Chandrasekar played for the song, Ilaya Nila Pozhigirathey in the film Payanangal Mudivathillai. “We worked with music directors Divakar, K.V. Mahadevan, M.S. Viswanthan and Sankar-Ganesh, before joining Ilayaraja,” said Mr. Chandrasekar. Source: The Hindu