Shantanu Thakur may get a berth in the cabinet of the Narendra Modi government this time, sources say. According to sources, as the buzz about the PM’s cabinet reshuffle is making rounds all over, MP Shantanu Thakur has been summoned to Delhi.

Shantanu Thakur is scheduled to hold a meeting with the central leaders in Delhi on Tuesday, sources said. Before the assembly elections, the BJP turned a blind eye to the Matua vote. However, three weeks ago, there was a lot of speculation about the political position of Shantanu Thakur, one of the leaders of the Matua community.

On the day of Mukul’s return to the Trinamool, three MLAs were absent from Dilip’s meeting in Bangaon. MP Shantanu was not there either. And that is where the speculation culminates. Why did he avoid the meeting? Missing MPs and MLAs did not respond.

Before the vote, Shantanu Thakur was upset about the non-implementation of the CAA.

At the center of this caste vote-bank politics is the Matua community— a scheduled caste group with a population of over 3 crore across the state, influencing over 70 assembly constituencies, and spread across the districts of North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas, Nadia, and other smaller pockets of North and South Bengal.

Moreover, West Bengal has 10 out of its 42 parliamentary constituencies reserved for the scheduled castes and has the second-highest SC population in the country.

Amid this, it is heard that this time Shantanu is going to get a place in Modi’s cabinet. Some BJP leaders have said that BJP MP Nishith Pramanik from West Bengal is also likely to join the cabinet. The BJP has done well in the last Lok Sabha and the Legislative Assembly elections. Nevertheless, political analysts say, Thakur’s place in the cabinet is his ‘much-awaited’ reward.

On Tuesday, West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and the leader of the opposition Suvendu Adhikari walked out of the Assembly session following an argument with the treasury bench. He was further joined by several other BJP MLAs after the Speaker called the matter of CM losing the Nandigram seat as ‘subjudice’.

“I raised the issue of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee losing in Nandigram. The Speaker said the matter is subjudice. I said then why I should stay here,” explained Adhikari.

Before leaving, Suvendu Adhikari asked the Speaker why should he stay if he cannot raise the matter.

This is the first Assembly Session being conducted after Mamata Banerjee-led TMC won the recently held elections in Bengal and retained power in the state. The session began on June 2 when the opening session of the newly constituted assembly was het-up after the Governor was forced to cut short his inaugural speech amid the commotion by opposition BJP MLAs who protested after finding “no mention” of post-poll violence in the speech.

Reportedly, Dhankhar tabled the speech after reading a few lines from an 18-page address approved by the state Cabinet.

When assembly election results were declared in May, the results announcement had taken a shocking turn late in the evening after Adhikari bagged the majority from Mamata Banerjee’s strong hold. The Nandigram bout underwent the most ferocious campaign as Mamata played her ‘Bengal’s daughter’ card, while Suvendu has accused TMC of only ‘promoting the nephew’.

Mamata, blaming her injury on BJP, vowed to conduct her campaign on a wheelchair with the BJP calling it ‘sympathy politics’. She has also termed Adhikaris as ‘Mir Jafars’ while Suvendu fearmongered that ‘Bengal will become mini-Pakistan’ if she is re-elected.

Nevertheless, after the fiery campaigning, Adhikari defeated Mamata Banerjee in the latter’s home-turf. Mamata later said that she will challenge the electoral verdict in court, and currently, the case is being heard in the Calcutta High Court.

Meanwhile, when Adhikari spoke on the issue of voting in Nandigram, Law Minister Malay Ghatak went to the Speaker Biman Banerjee and protested. After that, Banerjee told Shuvendu, “The matter is under trial, cannot be taken further as such. You should speak about something else.’’

The opposition MLAs, including Adhikari, walked out after the speaker’s speech. Banerjee, however, condemned the walkout.

Suchitra Pillai, whose latest show ‘Hello Mini 3’ is streaming on MX player, talked about her role and what made her accept the offer. The actress was gregarious in sharing her experience as an actress and also offered a glimpse into her filmography.

When asked about what led her to take up the role in ‘Hello Mini 3’, the actress said, “What got me hooked to this was the fact that Goldy Bahl (director) of the show called me after 23 years and said that only I can do this role .” Briefing about her character in the show, Suchitra said, “I play a head of some sort of cult. The character has a very hypnotic personality.” She added, “ It is very interesting and powerful role and is a new entrant in the show.” Responding to whether she has seen season 1 and season 2 of the show, Suchitra informed that season 2 was shot alongside season 3 but she did watch season 1.

What genre she prefers to watch, Suchitra responded, “I love watching thrillers, horror, and crime mystery. I must have been a detective in my last life. I don’t like war movies unless it’s something like ‘Platoon’.” 

“I have always been an actress who chooses to be part of all sorts of mediums be it theatre, TV, film, or OTT. I am a dubbing artist for international actresses for the Hindi versions of the movies. I have never curtailed myself to be in only one genre. A film will take a long time to make whereas in an OTT project finishes sooner,” she responded when asked about the difference in the three mediums. “With a daily soap, you are stuck with 22 days a month and that becomes a bit monotonous,” the actress added. “I have run the whole gamut. Theatre is my biggest and first love. Had the theatre paid me more or I was on Broadway, I would have been doing theatre only,” she admitted with a beaming smile.

Talking about her experience in the industry Suchitra shared, “I have been in the industry for 27 years, about 23 years in India and for four years before I was working in England. I have been a VJ, a part of the old tv serials and Balaji TV serials. My journey has been very interesting. I turned 50 last year and have no qualms in saying that I worked the most last year than I have in a long time.”

Talking about game-changing projects or roles in her career, she said, “The Hollywood film ‘The Valley’ which I did in 2016 was what got me my first tick off my career bucket list of winning an international award. I won the best actress award at the Milan Film festival. The movie was also a turning point for me story-wise. It’s a hard-hitting film that needs to be seen by all because it deals with teenage depression. OTT is the game changer for me. ‘Dil Chahta Hai’ was a game-changer for me as far as Indian Cinema is concerned.”

Suchitra added, “The OTT platform is another big game-changer for actors all around because of how we work, how we get more money and it’s interesting as you get more interesting stuff to do here. The storylines are different and the directors are experimenting which is great.”

“Last year, sitting seven months at home was like torture for me, as I am one of those people who needs to be doing 80 km a day in Mumbai. I was lucky that during the lockdown I had four releases on OTT that worked for me,” she replied when asked about what kept her going during these trying times.

On a concluding note, Suchitra said, “I have worked the most from September till now, I have done about seven or eight new projects. You are going to see me a lot this year in a lot of stuff and each one is completely different and I am very excited that MX player is the first one because why not start with being a Godwoman”.

The Covid-19 pandemic has initiated persistent calls for a greener global recovery. Its outcomes have made investors wary of the impacts of physical risks on the performance of an economy. Not only are individuals cautious about the effects of government and corporate actions on societies but they’re also equally worried about the direct consequences of their personal consumptive choices. This concern has pushed global investors to seek opportunities that incorporate ESG (Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance) metrics into financial markets worldwide. 

ESG are a rubric that considers the impact of corporations on sustainability and the lives of people. These parameters largely assign ratings to firms after looking at the effects of their undertakings on the wellbeing of their employees, the environment, and society. 

They begin by asking several questions such as the following: What impact does a company have on the environment? Does it pollute rivers, land or air? Does it do enough to curb the pollution and care for the communities impacted? Does it pay fair wages to employees who clean up the pollution, as well as employees in general? ESG metrics investigate answers to such questions and generate long-term market outlooks for firms based on the gathered data. Therefore, from our example, companies that fail to clean up their pollution or underpay their staff get poorer ESG scores, while those that pay well and care for the environment get higher scores. In terms of market performance, lower scores indicate a greater likelihood of poorer longer-term financial returns – a correlation backed by statistical studies — while higher scores indicate greater chances of promising longer-term financial yield.   

In today’s world, ESGs are booming. According to Bloomberg, these assets are on course to exceed $53 trillion (Rs 3,900 trillion) of the total $140.5 trillion (Rs 10,388 trillion) worth of global assets under management by 2025. Staggering numbers have already been recorded ever since the outbreak erupted last year in January. Assets in sustainable funds, worldwide, hit a record high of roughly $1.7 trillion (Rs 126 trillion) by the end of December 2020, almost 29% up from the previous quarter. Global inflows into ESG funds in the fourth quarter of 2020 were up by 88% in comparison to the previous quarter. In India, 7 of the 10 ESG funds were launched after lockdowns were opened in the second half of 2020 and nearly Rs 3748.96 crore (Rs 37.48 billion/ $505 million) or worth of net inflow was registered in the fourth financial quarter. In fact, as of April 30th, 2021, ESG funds in India manage assets worth Rs 10,377 crore (Rs 103.7 billion/ $1.39 billion). 

While ESGs in India are still largely juvenile in comparison to other global markets, they have already started outperforming traditional stock indices. According to the NSE Indexogram on April 30th, while one-year total returns for companies on the Nifty100 stood at 49.23%, they were registered at 54.08% for the Nifty100 ESG Index. The same was the case for a longer time frame. Five-year total returns stood at 14.64% for Nifty100. But for its ESG counterpart, it registered a minuscule, although significantly greater 16.3%. Clearly, the market seems to have picked up the track to ensure longer-term sustainability. The journey, however, is far from complete.  

ESGs largely lack a common definition. Most ESG metrics do not agree on where to draw a line on what can be called sustainable and what cannot. This is a global issue that threatens the very fabric that gives them the credibility investors seek. In the US, for example, there is no mandate from the SEC yet on how to define ESG. And while Europe recently came with a preliminary rubric on defining ESG, India’s SEBI too still has to develop a criterion. 

The problem in places like India, often also includes a lack of awareness amongst stockbrokers and fund managers. Not only are investors unaware of where to park their money, most stockbrokers and managers too are oblivious of the existing ESG indices and their future market scope. Henceforth, while most market experts are well aware of the concepts like net profits, EBITDA, or inflation, they are only beginning to learn about the impact of environmental and social performance on companies and vice versa. Under these circumstances, the biggest current driver of ESG funds in India isn’t really the domestic marketplace. Rather, such funds are mostly driven by foreign institutional investors who mandate investing in compliance with ESG parameters. India needs reforms and these need to come from the framework that structures its financial market.

First, the upcoming FY2022 voluntarily ESG disclosures declared by India’s SEBI need to be executed efficiently with complimentary guidelines that clearly define the ESG criteria. This hypothetical practice rather also has to be incorporated into the predeclared FY2023 compulsory ESG disclosures. Second, formal and more structured events educating fund managers about ESG compliance need to be carried out. Third, greater reporting requirements need to be mandated for firms to become transparent over time. And fourth, more concerted efforts need to be made to make ESG an integral part of looking at the fundamentals of a company. Only when these factors are collectively applied will India achieve the goal of maximising the opportunity for a greener recovery post Covid-19. 

Covid-19 has taught us all an important lesson on sustainability. It is only with a greener mindset can we better mitigate longer-term risks, such as climate change, that threaten the very existence of humanity. Therefore, it is of utmost importance that our market systems become compliant with the forerunning principles of sustainability. The future might, otherwise, be bleak.  

Shreyansh Singh Budhia is a researcher with Infinite Sum Modelling LLC, Seattle WA, USA & Dr Badri Narayanan Gopalakrishnan is the founder and director with Infinite Sum Modelling LLC, Seattle WA, USA.

About three decades ago, in the idyllic locales of Kerala, I was working in the traditional fisheries sector. In an attempt to enhance returns for fishermen who were getting a mere 20% of the market price of fish, we introduced new technology like fibreglass crafts and outboard motors and even launched beach level auctions. However, the greatest challenge which persisted was to open bank accounts for fishermen to streamline payments. In those days, it would take us a minimum of ten months to chase physical banks and manage to register a single account holder. Know Your Customer was an alien concept. Cut to 2021, you can walk into a bank branch and open a bank account in moments with eKYC and biometrics. Reducing the waiting time from months to minutes, digital transformation has truly enabled a paradigm shift.

Marking six years of the Digital India initiative, the Prime Minister has aptly described this to be India’s techade. Technological advancement and the rapid penetration of the internet has integrated over one billion citizens across India into a common financial, economic, and digital ecosystem. With the cheapest data rates in the world and close to 700 million internet users — every three seconds a new Indian user joins the internet. The Union Cabinet has just approved the implementation of BharatNet through a public-private partnership in sixteen states with official fibre connectivity to all inhabited villages. With over a billion plus biometrics, billion-plus mobiles and almost a billion bank accounts, we have built the largest identification system in the world mapping the entire population of India. To date, 1.29 billion Aadhaar IDs have been generated and 55.97 billion authentications have been carried out. Bridging the gap between the government and citizens has become the bedrock of India’s digitisation efforts.

A payment system that connects millions of Indians spanning across the coast of Gujarat to the farmlands of Uttar Pradesh and the mountains of Sikkim, there is a tremendous opportunity to make UPI a global and scalable architecture for digital payments. From powering a large corporate to empowering a vegetable seller, India’s stellar success story in facilitating quick, real-time mobile payments has left the world awestruck. In June 2021, UPI recorded 2.8 billion transactions worth Rs 5.47 trillion. UPI now has more than double the number of transactions that American Express does globally. Recently, Google wrote to the US Federal Reserve, applauding the successful implementation of UPI in India, and recommended the Federal Reserve System of the US to draw inspiration from India.

A notable innovation in the Digital India landscape has been the launch of aG2B (Government To Business) Government e-Marketplace. The GeM portal has successfully leveraged technology to transform the public procurement landscape. So far, the portal has crossed the 19.17 lakh seller registration milestone, about 5 times the number of sellers from last year. Tribal jewellery from Jharkhand, dry fruit from Kashmir, dance lessons from Chennai, textiles from Odisha — the intersection of e-commerce and the internet have created a robust ecosystem for Indian products and businesses to thrive in. The internet has been the greatest enabler for millions of Indians to scale their passion and produce into businesses and interact with customers globally.

Two key sectors that have received a massive impetus under the Digital India programme are health and education. These are crucial for improving the overall quality of life of Indian citizens and describe a holistic growth trajectory. In the hinterlands of India, gold-coloured beneficiary cards are considered to be lifesavers for many, doing away with the various pillars and posts that one had to run to for equitable access to healthcare. The Pradhan Mantri Jan Aarogya Yojana (PMJAY) is a unique blend of healthcare and technology and is the most comprehensive cashless, contactless, paperless and digital health insurance scheme in the world that covers over 500 million citizens in India, equivalent to the population of Europe. PMJAY along with the National Digital Health Mission (NDHM) is massively improving end to end healthcare delivery in India, inching towards a system that is totally technology-enabled through data integration and standardisation. An example that truly resounds with this vision for a connected healthcare system, emerges from an aspirational district in western Uttar Pradesh. Chitrakoot, despite its developmental challenges, has wonderfully leveraged common service centres, village level entrepreneurs and ASHA workers to build an effective telemedicine delivery mechanism for all residents of the district. Under this intervention, patients in remote areas can avail specialist care without having to travel from their homes to hospitals, saving considerable time and money.

Digitisation and internet penetration have contributed phenomenally towards improving learning outcomes for students across India. Primary schools in Nawada, a remote aspirational district in Bihar are home to SMART classrooms, completely equipped with digital tools and internet connectivity, bringing knowledge from the world to Indian villages. The model of SMART classrooms and e-learning has been rapidly replicated across states, introducing students from rural areas to a whole new world of learning. During the pandemic, several online learning initiatives deployed by the government – DIKSHA, ePathshala, Swayam played an instrumental role in ensuring continued education for students in the most remote corners of the country.

The transformation of India into a digital society and a knowledge economy has tremendously improved the ease of living for citizens. Universally accessible digital resources like the India Post which is the largest computerised and networked postal system in the world, the AyushSanjivani application, DigiLocker, UMANG app, Tele Law for legal advice, the SVANidhi scheme for street vendors and the launch of 10,000 BPCL CSC points for easy booking of gas cylinders are some of the tools that are maximising governance and minimising government for Indian citizens. Another revolutionary product of Digital India is the MyGov platform which is the world’s largest interactive digital democracy portal promoting participative governance.

As India moves from being data-rich to data intelligent, Machine Learning and AI will find solutions to a vast number of its challenges — water availability, learning outcomes, health improvement and enhanced agriculture productivity. Going forward, I believe that the development of world-class technology products requires critical inputs from data-hungry young entrepreneurs and an AI-enabling policy environment. India should nurture an innovative breed of socially conscious and development-oriented product managers, AI scientists, product designers and software engineers.

Building inclusive technology solutions are about high volumes with the availability of services at low cost and the convenience of video and voice in vernacular languages. This requires a full-stack design approach keeping in mind the unique attributes of India’s diversity, with special emphasis on the needs of people living in remote parts of the country. To script an unprecedented success story of digital transformation, it is imperative to be fully cognisant of the aspirations and the potential of the population residing in rural and relatively disconnected parts of India. How we enable and empower the spirit of entrepreneurship among them so that they leverage technology capabilities and data to provide solutions for not merely the people of India but the next five billion people of the world who will be moving from poverty to middle class, is going to be the cornerstone of the next Digital India techade.

Amitabh Kant is CEO, NITI Aayog. The views expressed are personal.

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday pulled up Twitter for delay in appointment of a Resident Grievance Officer as per New IT rules. “If Twitter thinks it can take as long as it wants in our country, that will not be allowed,” the court said.

In a related development, Twitter India MD Manish Maheshwari on Tuesday told the Karnataka High Court that he is ready to appear before the Uttar Pradesh Police in Ghaziabad within 24 hours, though the police will have to assure that he will not be arrested. The Karnataka High Court was hearing a plea filed by Manish Maheshwari against the notice issue to him by the Ghaziabad Police over tweets posted after a video of an elderly Muslim man being assaulted in Loni, Ghaziabad went viral on Twitter.

In the Delhi High Court, appearing for Twitter India, Senior Advocate Sajan Poovayya submitted that the social media giant was presently not in compliance with the IT Rules, 2021 as it did not have a Resident Grievance Officer. He stated that an interim Grievance Officer was appointed, but was removed on June 21.

“After 21 June, till July 6, the least you could have done was appoint another person. How long does your process take? If Twitter thinks it can take as long it wants in our country, I will not allow that,” the court said. Appearing for Centre, ASG Chetan Sharma submitted that “IT Rules came into effect in February 2021 after which three months’ time was granted. It expired in May and now we are in July where there is about 40 days delay in compliance of the rules”.

The Delhi High Court observed, “I’m not giving them (Twitter inc) any protection, you’re free to take any action you want.” Asked by the court to take a proper timeline from Twitter, Tweeter’s advocate requested a day as the social media giant’s headquarters are in the US.

“You better come up with a clear response or you will be in trouble,” the High Court responded, posting the next hearing to Thursday.

Meanwhile, appearing for Twitter India MD Manish Maheshwari, senior advocate CV Nagesh said: “If the court records the submission of the UP Police that they are not going to lay their hand upon me, then I am willing to appear before the police personally, provided they give an undertaking.”

UP Police has, however, questioned the High Court’s jurisdiction to hear the petition filed by Maheshwari. The First Information Report (FIR) was registered in Ghazaiabad and notices were issued to Maheshwari at Twitter’s Delhi and Mumbai office, the UP police said. Senior advocate CV Nagesh responded: “For a moment, it is not disputed that I am a resident of Bangalore. It is also not disputed that the establishment of ninth accused (Twitter India) is in Bangalore. We are not in Ghaziabad. Twitter India office is at RMZ Infinity, Bangalore. So jurisdiction is of Karnataka High Court.”

On 24 June, the court had passed an interim order restraining Uttar Pradesh police from taking coercive action against Manish Maheshwari pursuant to the notice issued to him under Section 41A of the Code of Criminal Procedure in the Ghaziabad FIR. The same has been challenged by the UP Police before the Supreme Court.