Tag: vaccination

Kerala HC dismisses plea to remove PM Modi’s photo from vaccination certificate

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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The Kerala High Court on Tuesday dismissed a plea seeking removal of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s photograph from COVID-19 vaccination certificates and imposed a cost of Rs 1 lakh on the petitioner by terming the petition as “frivolous”, being “politically motivated” and a “publicity interest litigation”. Justice P V Kunhikrishnan directed the petitioner — Peter Myaliparampil — to deposit the cost in favour of the Kerala State Legal Services Authority (KeLSA) within six weeks.

The court said in case of failure to deposit the cost within the stipulated period, KeLSA shall recover the amount from his assets by initiating revenue recovery proceedings against him. It said the cost was being imposed to let people and the society know that frivolous pleas like this which waste judicial time will not be entertained by the court.

The court also said that the “frivolous contentions” by the petitioner objecting to the PM’s photo and his “morale boosting message” on the vaccination certificate, was “not expected from a citizen of the country”. It also said that when there are thousands of criminal appeals, bail pleas, civil suits and matrimonial cases pending in the courts, frivolous petitions like the instant one waste judicial time.

The court had previously observed what was wrong in Covid-19 vaccination certificates carrying the photograph of the Prime Minister when he was elected to power by the people of the country. The court had also remarked, “They may not be proud of their PMs, we are proud of our PM” and had asked the petitioner — “why are you ashamed of the Prime Minister? He came to power through the mandate of the people…we may have different political views, but he is still our PM.” The petitioner had contended that the certificate was a private space with personal details on record and therefore, it was inappropriate to intrude into the privacy of an individual.

He had contended that adding the Prime Minister’s photo to the certificate was an intrusion into an individual’s private space. The petitioner, a senior citizen, had contended in his plea that the Prime Minister’s photo on his vaccination certificate was a violation of fundamental rights.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

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Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Omicron variant was circulating in nations before it was identified in South Africa: Experts

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

COVID-19 vaccine incentives in India: Edible oil, mobile phone, dinner sets and much more for double-jabbed

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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India’s vaccination program has picked up pace after an incredibly spotty start. While over 80 percent of the country has got at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, some regions and districts are still lagging.

States, businesses and others are offering unique incentives to encourage individuals to get both doses of the COVID vaccine. The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) has resorted to providing one litre of edible oil and mobile phones via lucky draw to vaccine-takers in a bid to encourage people to take vaccination.

Here are some of the incentives that were offered to people to get vaccinated:

IndiGo, India’s biggest airline, had offered a discount of 10 percent on air tickets to anyone who has received at least one vaccine dose.

Multinational fast-food chain McDonald’s had been offering a discount of 20 percent on its meals to fully vaccinated individuals, while online grocery retailing platform Grofers has offered a 20 percent discount on its monthly discount program.

In Madhya Pradesh, Vishnu Khatri, a BJP MLA from Bhopal’s Berasia Assembly constituency, had announced that everyone who got vaccinated from the constituency before June 30 would get free mobile recharge

In Tamil Nadu, DMK MLA Udhayanidhi Stalin started offering bags containing rice, edible oil, wheat flour, rava and condiments to the residents of his Chepauk-Thiruvallikeni constituency who got vaccinated.

Nuh administration in Haryana offered a variety of incentives like discounts on medicines, dinner sets, and helmets to fully and partially vaccinated individuals.

Earlier in the month, the Chandrapur Municipal Corporation in Maharashtra announced a vaccination bumper lucky draw, with lucrative prizes ranging from LED TVs, refrigerators to washing machines.

Some states in India along with state-owned banks have introduced exclusive fixed deposit schemes for individuals who have been inoculated.

Restaurants in Delhi and Gurgaon were offering free beer and discounts. Residents of Rajkot were being wooed with gold nose pins and hand blenders.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Demand revival strong; super premium portfolio growing at double-digits: Diageo India

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Hina Nagarajan, MD & CEO of Diageo India, on Friday, said that the super-premium portfolio is about 20 percent of sales and it is growing at double-digits.

Diageo-owned United Spirits, the leading beverage alcohol company, reported strong earnings for the September-ended quarter.

“That (super premium) is about early 20 percent in our portfolio and it has been growing at high double-digits because our strategy is to accelerate luxury and premium, given that we are going to have a real increase in the number of high networth individual (HNI) households in the country. We do expect that this will grow faster as it has in the past, and become of greater salience,” Nagarajan said in an interview to CNBC-TV18.

Also Read: Premium products picking up as bars & restaurants opening up: United Breweries

On demand, she said, “Demand is coming back after the second wave of COVID-19. So, we feel very positive and confident about the momentum, going forward.”

Also Read: Top supply chain trends to watch out during festive season sales in 2021

“The consumer sentiment is positive with a high vaccination rate. Our customers expect to have full occupancy during the festival season. We are already seeing an uptick in trade. The only thing, I would say, is that given the different ways of working now, office-hour get-togethers have become fewer and weekend hangouts have become higher, but overall it looks very positive. We are very confident about the momentum in the third quarter,” said Nagarajan.

For the entire management interview, watch the video

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

SBI Cards on growth path post pandemic: CEO Rama Mohan Rao Amara

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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SBI Cards & Payment Services has positioned itself for post-pandemic growth, CEO and Managing Director Rama Mohan Rao Amara told CNBC-TV18. The remarks come after the payment solutions provider reported a weak set of earnings for the September quarter though provisions came down.

Also Read: Nomura raises SBI Cards target price, says asset quality drags behind now

“The spend story has been a pretty good story. We were able to spot the opportunities, we were able to see the revival, which was coming back very strongly on the backdrop of this COVID-19 vaccination coverage improving etc., and positioned ourselves in a right way with the right offers and right merchant partnerships, which has culminated in very good growth in retail spends,” Amara said.

Also Read: SBI Cards, Birlasoft, Firstsource, 5 other new stocks in F&O fall up to 4%

On card issuance, he said, “We want to come back to a usable capacity of 10,000 new accounts per day and we are happy to say that we have even crossed during the quarter. So our endeavour will be to continue this momentum and also ramp it up further as we make progress in terms of digitisation and provide end to end opportunities.”

For the entire management interview, watch the video

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Higher sero-prevalence, time to relax COVID curbs? Experts weigh in

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Higher sero-prevalence, over 21 crore of the population fully vaccinated and a steady vaccination programme – are these signs for state governments to perhaps open up the economic floodgates further?

Take Mumbai for instance – a recent serosurvey conducted among over 8,000 people highlights a sero-prevalence of 86 percent. This means that 86 out of 100 people have developed antibodies against COVID-19 infections. However, the Maharashtra government is yet to relax the curbs for the city. Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations may have been a deterrent.

Also Read: No indication of 3rd COVID-19 wave anywhere in Maharashtra, says Health Minister Rajesh Tope

On a national level, the overall sero-prevalence stands at 67 percent, a fifth of the eligible population have received both doses as we speak. But here’s a caveat – the National Sero Survey was conducted in June.

Are the serosurveys conclusive enough to assess the COVID situation in the country and the fear of waning immunity? To discuss this issue, CNBC-TV18‘s Archana Shukla spoke to Dr Sujata Baveja, co-Investigator of Mumbai Sero Survey and Prof K Srinath Reddy, president of PHFI.

Baveja said, “This serosurvey tells you basically the exposure population to the coronavirus. It always does not reflect the protective measures. With sero-prevalence to the extent of 86 percent, I myself got COVID-19 last week. But at the same time, it does not mean that we can do away with the COVID appropriate behaviour. So, we have a long way as far as the COVID-19 is concerned. Besides vaccination, we also need to follow appropriate COVID behaviour for us to be well in control of the situation in Mumbai.”

“Yes 90 percent of the people who have been vaccinated have these antibodies, but we are seeing breakthrough infections, whenever there is a breach in the protocol of your COVID appropriate behaviour. The vaccination gives you protection, but it does not prevent totally breakthrough infection. The only good thing which does is if at all you have an infection, the infection will be very mild and it will not be serious. So we have to have vaccination as well as overall appropriate behaviour,” she said.

Also Read: Pfizer, BioNTech say trials find COVID vaccine safe for children of 5-11 yrs

Prof. Reddy said, “I believe we cannot really equate seropositivity with neutralising capacity of the immune response against either the currently circulating viruses or fresh variants that may emerge. It is very likely that there will be a considerable amount of immunity in the population, but we have not tested it yet. We also do not know whether how much cellular immunity has been built up, how many memory cells have been created and therefore, there are a number of issues related to the nature of the immune response that we still have to deal with. However, since we have no assurance that there is foolproof protection against infection, either with the currently circulating variants, or more dangerously against new variants, which might emerge with not only greater infectivity, but with greater vaccine evasion capacity, more of a vaccine escape, we still have to be very careful for quite some time.”

He said, “We still have to protect ourselves with the kind of precautions we need to take, even while opening up the economy. I am not saying that the economy should be bolted and shut, all the schools should be bolted and shut. But we need to open up taking all due precautions at the moment. We cannot believe that herd immunity has arrived.”

For the full interview, watch the accompanying video…

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Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Must sustain vaccination pace to limit damage to economy, says FM Nirmala Sitharaman

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the government emphasised the need to sustain the pace of vaccination to limit the damage to the economy.

In an interview with CNN-News18, Sitharaman said, “Within the country, we have to keep going with the vaccination. If protection from the corona is given to people with the vaccines, I think that would eliminate many related risks.”

Taking a note of delays seen in infra expenditure, she said that efforts are underway to resolve the issue by Q3 or Q4 of FY22. “Delay in expenditure has been noted. Hopefully, in Q3FY22 and Q4FY22 we will clear it. So slippages, if anything – which should be worrying me – are if they are not spending, the infrastructure spending. But I wouldn’t think that would be a worry because most of the departments are conscious that they should go ahead with it.”

When asked about Air India disinvestment, she mentioned, “I am confident that we will be moving with disinvestment targets also. It is going on and keeping the time schedule. We will see how it goes because you will know when the tender documents are opened and what offers we have given everybody.”

For more, watch the video.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Vaccination is the medicine to boost economy: Nirmala Sitharaman

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Holding that 73 crore people of the country’s population have received their vaccination, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday said vaccination was the only medicine to boost the economy as it allows people to conduct businesses regularly or farmers to carry out farming activity.

“Vaccination programme has been going on smoothly in the country and so far 73 crore people have already received jabs free of charge. Today, through vaccination programme, people were able to conduct business, traders were able to procure products to run businesses, (thereby) boosting economy, or farmers were able to do farming…So, vaccination is the only medicine (to combat the virus, to boost economy)…,” she said. Sitharaman made those comments while delivering her address at the centenary celebrations of Tamilnad Mercantile Bank here on Sunday.

On Sunday, the health ministry in Tamil Nadu eyeing to inoculate 20 lakh people is holding a ‘Mega Vaccination Camp’ through 40,000 camps being conducted across the State. “All our prayers are not for a third wave (of the Covid-19 virus). Suppose, if it occurs, then one has to think about the availability of hospitals, even if there is an hospital, does it have an ICU and even if there is an ICU, does it have an oxygen support? For all these questions, the Ministry announced a scheme allowing hospitals to ramp up expansion when there was huge impact in the country caused by the second wave (of Covid-19),” she said.

Sitharaman said hospitals located in rural areas were able to take up expansion work by availing the schemes announced by the Ministry, including the “viability gap funding” scheme. “Through the report by Tamilnad Mercantile Bank, we are able to see that they take the schemes announced by the Ministry to the beneficiaries (hospitals). It is a necessary (in today’s scenario). Not only public sector banks, private sector banks should follow suit,” she said.

Earlier, paying rich encomiums to the Nadar community for establishing the bank in May 1921 in Tuticorin, the Minister said today Tamilnad Mercantile Bank has gained “universal acceptance” and has presence in all the 26 states and four union territories. Even a famous Greek writer who has written a lot of global economic affairs has also mentioned about the Nadar community in his book, she said.

“So today it is no more a Nadar community bank nor a bank from Tuticorin, it has countrywide presence and has deposits of over Rs 41,000 crore.”, she said. Stating that the bank has been taking a cautious step in its approach to do business, Sitharaman said “by strictly following the basic principles, the bank was able to tide over any kind of crisis situation and has managed to run for one hundred years.” .

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

COVID-19 vaccination: Second dose delayed for over 1.6 crore Indians, says govt data

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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The COVID-19 vaccination numbers have risen in India amid warnings of an impending third wave. However, reports suggest that there are still at least 1.6 crore Indians who are yet to get their second shot a little less than 16 weeks after the first.

This figure was arrived at by comparing how many people got their first shot as of May 2, 2021, with the total number of people who have so far got their second dose. The government had on May 13 given the go-ahead to increase the gap between the two doses of Covishield (12-16 weeks) and Covaxin (4-6 weeks).

Government data suggests that the number of people who are eligible for their second shot after 12 weeks stands at 3.9 crore. Out of 12.8 crore people who have been vaccinated, around 11.2 crore have received both the doses.

Over one crore in the 60+ category, about 45 lakh in the 45-59 age group, 12 lakh odd health workers and 1.8 lakh frontline workers are yet to receive their second dose.

Also read: COVID-19: This Indian city aims to vaccinate all citizens above 18 in next 10-15 days

A report by The Times of India suggests that the number of people whose second dose is delayed may be higher as the government data has not taken into consideration those who have received the Covaxin shot.

To encourage vaccination, the government has introduced a feature where people can book vaccine slots on WhatsApp.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

COVID-19: This Indian city aims to vaccinate all citizens above 18 in next 10-15 days

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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As vaccination numbers are picking up in India, the adult population of a southern city may be fully inoculated against COVID-19 in the next two to three weeks.

The Telangana government has announced it would make Hyderabad 100 percent vaccinated over the next 15 days. Telangana Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar has instructed officials of the health department and Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) to work closely to conduct surveys and vaccinate everyone above the age of 18 at the earliest.

Kumar has directed medical and municipal staff apart to carry out the COVID-19 inoculation drive in mission mode after the move witnessed a positive response from the people in GHMC limits. According to the plan, special teams would be formed and deployed in colonies. The drive will be operational from 9 am to 4 pm every day to achieve the target.

The GHMC would make use of the 175 mobile vaccination vans to administer the shots against COVID-19 to people.

Telangana has so far administered nearly 1.65 crore doses of COVID-19 with 56 percent of the population receiving at least one dose while 34 percent have been fully vaccinated.

Also Read: Zydus Cadila’s ZyCoV-D, first COVID-19 vaccine in India for children gets nod from regulator; all details here

The state’s chief secretary has claimed that nearly 90 percent of the beneficiaries in the GHMC region have received at least the first dose, according to reports.

Even as the GHMC is on an overdrive to make Hyderabad 100 percent vaccinated, the state registered 409 cases in the last 24 hours (August 20) while the GHMC region reported 71 new cases. As per the Telangana COVID-19 tracker site, the number of active cases stood at 6,728 as of August 20.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

3 Mins Read

Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow