News Analysis India

Tag: private sector

  • Bengaluru water crisis: ‘From tech city to tanker city’: PM Modi blames Congress mismanagement for Bengaluru’s water crisis

    Prime Minister Narendra Modi criticized the Congress government in Karnataka for mismanaging Bengaluru’s infrastructure, particularly highlighting the severe water crisis in parts of the city. He highlighted the issue of water rationing and penalties for excessive water usage, accusing the Congress government of turning the tech hub into a city dependent on water tankers controlled by a mafia.”The Congress government in Karnataka has turned the tech city into a tanker city, and left it to the tanker mafia,” he said. Modi accused the Congress of being against the private sector, taxpayers, and wealth creation. He emphasized his focus on India’s development and global reputation, contrasting it with the opposition’s focus solely on him.”The Congress is anti-private sector, anti-taxpayer, and anti-wealth creator… the (Opposition bloc) INDIA’s focus is on Modi, but my focus is on India’s development, its global image,” he said.AllUttar PradeshMaharashtraTamil NaduWest BengalBiharKarnatakaAndhra PradeshTelanganaKeralaMadhya PradeshRajasthanDelhiOther StatesModi mocked the opposition alliance, stating they’re stuck on repeat while he and his allies showcase their accomplishments. He highlighted the candidacies of BJP MPs Tejasvi Surya and PC Mohan in Bangalore South and Central, respectively, and Union Minister Shobha Karandlaje in Bangalore North. In Bangalore Rural, BJP’s candidate is CN Manjunath, the son-in-law of former Prime Minister Deve Gowda, as part of an alliance with the JD(S).”In these elections, the leaders of the INDIA alliance are roaming around with a worn-out tape recorder. Meanwhile, Modi and his partners are walking around with their track record, and that’s why we have come here in Bengaluru to seek your blessings,” PM Modi said.PM Modi had previously held large rallies in Kalaburagi and Shivamogga. He shared the stage with Deve Gowda during a rally in Mysuru on April 14, followed by a roadshow in Mangaluru.He also mentioned that Karnataka is going to vote in two phases, with the first phase on April 26 and the second phase on May 7.

    (With inputs from PTI)

  • UP govt does away with night shift for women factory workers

    Express News Service

    LUCKNOW: In order to provide a secure working atmosphere for women and to protect their professional rights, the Uttar Pradesh government has taken a significant decision to do away with the night shift for the women workers in factories across the state.

    The UP labour department issued the GO to notify the decision late Friday night. It makes it clear that women workers will not be compelled to stay back for work beyond 7 pm at the workplace and would not be called to work before 6 am without their written consent.

    As per the sources, the decision would be applicable in the private sector as well. The GO adds that before 6 am and after 7 pm if the woman worker refuses to work, she would not be terminated from employment. So far there had been no provision for women workforce working in state factories.

    The UP government has notified the exemptions to women workforce across all the mills and factories in the state under the powers vested in the Factories Act-1948 following the work plan of women employees.

    Besides, the GO also provides free pick and drop transportation facilities by the employer for those who give written consent to work the night shift.

    As per the GO, the employer will be liable to provide dinner to women workers working between 7 pm and 6 am. They should also be given sufficient protective supervision during working hours and journeys after completing the night shift.

    The state government makes the employer liable to ensure toilets, washrooms, changing-room, drinking facilities, and lights near the workplace of the women workforce along with the provision of allowing not less than four women workers to work on the premises or a particular department between 7 pm to 6 am.

    To spruce up the working environs and make it secure for women workers, the GO says that the employer shall intimate the arrangement proposed by him for female workers’ employment to the Inspector of factories (labour inspector) of the region concerned, for verification. The verification should be completed within a period of a maximum of seven days.

    The employer is also expected to send a monthly report electronically or otherwise to the Inspector of factories of the region concerned about the details of women workers engaged during the night shift.

    The employer has also been made liable to report, in case there is some untoward incident, to the Inspector of factories and local police station promptly.

    On the other, the labour inspector has also been entrusted with the responsibility of ensuring safe working conditions for women workers and conducting inspections from time to time to ensure that there is no non-compliance with the provisions at the workplace.

    The onus of providing a secure working atmosphere to the women workers will lie with the employer to prevent an incident of sexual harassment in the workplace. Moreover, the GO makes it mandatory for the employer to inculcate a robust complaint mechanism in the factory in compliance with the provisions of the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 or in any other related enactments.

    The GO also expects the employer to make the women workers aware of their rights by displaying the guideline prominently.

  • Space tech is limit for private sector, startups

    Express News Service

    BENGALURU: Indian private companies in the space technology sector can look forward to playing an active role in India’s space industry and significantly increase its share in the $440 billion global space sector from its present 2 per cent. This was the message at the International Space Conference, organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CI I ) virtually on Monday. Pawan Goenka, recently appointed Chairman-Designate, Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN–SPACe), set a target of achieving 10 percent of the global space market share, and pointed out that India’s private investment in the startup ecosystem in this sector was about $22 million.

    This is less than half a percent of investments made in startups in the space sector globally. More investments are needed, he said. IN–SPACe, an organisation under India’s Department of Space (DoS), is a single-window nodal agency to facilitate and regulate space activities in the country.“While the government sector will continue to push frontiers of science and technology, we should have the private sector move aggressively to pursue the space sector,” he said.

    There are a lot of untapped opportunities for Indian companies to supply outside the country. “That is not happening in a big way as yet. We need to understand why and how we can increase that,” he said. There is an interest in the private sector and tech startups in the space sector over the last three to four years.

    “The only way to work increase their share is to set a target, find a strategy, put action plans together, define responsibilities for stakeholders and monitor progress,” said Goenka, who has planned to meet stakeholders over the next few weeks to get a sense of issues that are holding the sector back, and define a timeline for goals set.

    Netherlands, Oz keen to work on Indian space programme

    The Netherlands and Australia have expressed interest in working with the Indian space ecosystem jointly and collaboratively, he said. Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman K Sivan, who is also DoS Secretary, said, “The department (DoS) sees startups as new-age industry partners and the potential future partners who can contribute to space economy. We will enable them to become competitive with other big global players.” After initiating reforms, DoS received 40 applications — mostly from startups — for utilising ISRO’s facilities and each proposal is being looked into. Sivan stressed on the big scope for foreign companies to tie up with Indian firms.

    “Our space FDI (foreign direct investment) policy is getting revised and this will open big opportunities for foreign space companies to invest in India. This will ensure a sustained engagement between Indian and overseas companies which will benefit both,” he said. ISRO Scientific Secretary R Umamaheshwaran, who is also incharge of IN-SPACe activities, said plans are afoot for the Indian industry to play a larger role in satellite communications (Satcom). DoS is finalising policies on Satcom and remote sensing to help the Indian industry further penetrate the space applications domain.

    The Space Activities Bill is going through various departmental reviews, inter-ministerial consultations before being finally tabled in Parliament, Umamaheshwaran said. The private sector was allowed to enter the domain of building of rockets, satellites and providing launch services last year when the government also constituted IN-SPACe under DoS as a separate vertical. Besides, it acts as a link between ISRO and the private sector.

  • Private sector to drive growth in India’s space industry

    Express News Service

    CHENNAI: With India currently having an abysmal market share of 2 per cent in the global space sector, which is worth $440 billion, efforts are underway to restructure the country’s space sector with more aggressive participation from private industries and attracting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).

    Chairman-designate of Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Centre (IN-SPACe) Pawan Goenka on Monday said India, despite being one of the foremost space-faring nations, has not managed to reap benefits. 

    “I am not from the space sector, but would like India to increase its market share to 10 per cent. My first priority would be to bring regulatory and policy framework long awaited by private industry,” said Goenka at the inaugural International Space Conference and Exhibition.       

    He also rued the fact that India’s total investment in the start-up ecosystem in space sector is about $22 million, which is less than 0.5 per cent of global investment. He said, “There is a lot of interest among start-ups in the space sector in India. Cooperation among all the stakeholders is a must to take the initiative forward.”

    Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) K Sivan said the Department of Space received about 40 proposals, mostly from start-ups, after the Union government announced space reforms in June last year. “We are processing those applications. The government is also revising the FDI policy in space sector. The new policy will open up huge avenues for foreign space companies to invest in India. This will ensure a sustained engagement between India and overseas companies,” Sivan added. 

    Last year, in order to maximise benefits from the space assets, various reforms were mooted. Among them are encouraging Non-Government-Private-Entities (NGPEs) to make launch vehicles and satellites; NewSpace India Limited (NSIL) to take ownership from the Department of Space for operational launch vehicles, commercialise launches, satellites and services; ISRO to concentrate more on technology advancements and carrying out space missions.

    Country’s start-up ecosystem lessIndia’s total investment in the start-up ecosystem in space sector is about $22 million, which is less than 0.5 per cent of global investment

  • The state government will give all possible help to every initiative of the private sector in the interest of farmers and forest dwellers, including the establishment of processing units: Bhupesh Baghel

    Bhupesh Baghel while addressing the program said that the state government would give all possible help to every initiative taken by the private sector in the interest of farmers and forest dwellers, including the establishment of food processing units. The Chief Minister said that it is a matter of happiness that the private sector entrepreneurs have tested the possibilities of processing vegetables and fruits in Chhattisgarh and they are increasing their participation rapidly in the field of food processing. The Chief Minister said that it is the endeavor of the State Government to ensure that the farmers get the right price for their produce. For this, efforts are being made to set up a wide range of Food Parks for the protection, storage and processing of the produce. Preparations are being made to set up 110 food parks in Chhattisgarh. For this the land has been identified. A target has been set to establish at least one food park in each development block of the state. He said that all types of fruits and vegetables are produced in abundance in Chhattisgarh. Many a times farmers do not get the right price for their produce. Forest produce is also abundantly produced in the state. But due to lack of systematic system of collection and processing of forest produce, on many occasions the collectors do not get proper economic benefits. The Chief Minister said that in order to ensure that farmers and forest dwellers get the right price for their products, the State Government has started the process of processing these products by marking them area wise. Van Dhan Kendras have been established for their processing through Self Help Groups collecting forest produce.

  • Open to suggestions from industry in framing rules for law on job quota: Haryana Dy CM Dushyant Chautala

    By PTI
    CHANDIGARH: The Haryana government is open to including suggestions from industry bodies while framing rules for the law that provides 75 per cent reservation in the private sector to job seekers from the state, Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala said on Sunday.

    The first meeting for framing the rules will be held here on Monday, he said.

    Last week, Governor Satydeo Narain Arya gave his assent to the Haryana State Employment of Local Candidates Bill, 2020, providing 75 per cent reservation for those who have a domicile certificate and are seeking private-sector jobs that a monthly salary of less than Rs 50,000.

    “It will be our endeavour to frame the rules by the end of this month. Next month, we will run employment drives in all 22 districts and 67 employment exchanges in the state,” Chautala, who holds the industries portfolio, said at a news conference here.

    Responding to criticism from various quarters, including some members of the industry, he alleged that many people have “misconception” about the law and pointed out that Haryana was not the only state where such a provision had been made.

    Chautala said the state government held eight rounds of meeting with industry associations before this law was made “and even now we will hold consultations with them”.

    “After consultations, if we have to incorporate some technical things in the rules, will do that so that industry comes to our state in an even bigger way,” the deputy chief minister said.

    “Earlier too we had sought suggestions from them. We will now seek suggestions from industry associations of our state and chambers of industry bodies. We will write to them with copies of the bill and seek suggestions for framing the rules,” he said.

    In reply to a question, Chautala said Haryana remains a favourite destination for the industry and added that a leading lithium battery manufacturing company was setting up a plant at an investment of Rs 7,500 crore.

    “Top companies, including Amazon, are ready to invest in Haryana,” he said.

    Hitting out at the opposition, he said not even one factory has moved out of the state even during the coronavirus pandemic.

    Asked why a section of the industry was opposing the state government’s reservation move, the deputy chief minister said, “If there are objections, observations of industry, we will hold consultations and resolve it. That is the job of the state government.”

    On the issue of crop procurement, he said Haryana will start procurement of six crops, including wheat, at minimum support price next month.

    “Wheat procurement will begin from April 1 in nearly 400 mandis,” Chautala said, adding the farmers will have the option to get the payment for their crops procured directly into their accounts within 48 hours or through ‘Arhitiyas’ (commission agents).

    Chautala said a majority of the 67.48 per cent farmers from the state have expressed their wish to take payment directly into their bank accounts.

    On the farmers’ protest at Delhi’s borders against the three Central farm laws, he said the leaders should hold dialogue with the Union government to resolve the issue.