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☆ Adani crisis: Modi's party has 'nothing to hide', says India home minister
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-14 | by ( Sudipto Ganguly | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/2] BJP President Amit Shah and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi are seen after the election results in New Delhi, India, May 23, 2019. The Adani group has denied the allegations and threatened legal action against Hindenburg. Without referring to Adani, Modi told parliament last week that the "blessings of 1.4 billion people in the country are my protective cover and you can't destroy it with lies and abuses", as opposition lawmakers chanted "Adani, Adani". Adani Power (ADAN.NS) and Adani Green Energy (ADNA.NS) fell too in a wider Mumbai market (.NSEI) that was up slightly. India's Economic Times daily reported on Tuesday that Adani group executives had been holding negotiations since last week with Abu Dhabi's International Holding Corp (IHC) for capital infusion into Adani Enterprises or other group entities.

☆ India's largest insurer LIC says it may review stake in Adani after management meeting
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-13 | by ( Sumathi Bala | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

watch nowIndia's largest insurer says it "might" review its stake in the embattled Adani Group after meeting with the management. "We propose to speak to them about this ... just to try and understand what's really happening within the organization, within the Adani group." In a further blow, global index provider MSCI last week said it will cut the weightings of some Adani Group businesses, including flagship firm Adani Enterprises. Still, the LIC chairman said the national insurer isn't too concerned about the conglomerate's high debt levels or the recent volatility in Adani's share price. Adani falloutThe Adani fallout has raised concerns about the group's exposure to India's leading banks and insurers.

☆ India's Modi lashes opposition as Adani allegations persist
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Shivam Patel | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Modi spent a nearly 90-minute speech to parliament mainly listing governments achievements and without naming the under-fire Adani Group. However, opposition lawmakers who are demanding an investigation into the business group interrupted him several times shouting slogans. "The blessings of 1.4 billion people in the country is my protective cover and you can't destroy it with lies and abuses," said Modi as opposition lawmakers chanted "Adani, Adani". Adani Transmission (ADAI.NS), Adani Power (ADAN.NS) and Adani Wilmar (ADAW.NS) rose 5% each, while Adani Green (ADNA.NS) and Adani Total Gas Ltd (ADAG.NS) fell 5% each. They have questioned investments made by state-run Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIFI.NS) and the State Bank of India (SBI.NS) in Adani Group companies.

Adani Group has denied the allegations, saying it complies with all laws and has made necessary disclosures over time. On Monday though, Adani Group said it will pre-pay $1.11 billion of loans on shares. Separately, JPMorgan on Tuesday said the group companies were still eligible for inclusion in the bank's bond indexes. The cumulative losses of Adani group's seven listed companies still stand at $109 billion despite Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone (APSE.NS) also gaining 2.6% on Tuesday and Adani Wilmar (ADAW.NS) adding 5%. Many Adani group companies report results this week.

☆ Some Adani shares climb, after group's market losses top $110 bln
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/2] The logo of the Adani Group is seen on the facade of one of its buildings on the outskirts of Ahmedabad, India, April 13, 2021. REUTERS/Amit DaveBENGALURU, Feb 7 (Reuters) - Shares of some listed Adani group companies, including its flagship, rose in early trade on Tuesday while others fell further as the reverberations from a U.S. short-seller's critical report on the Indian conglomerate continued to be felt. Adani group's seven listed companies have lost $110 billion in cumulative stock market value since Hindenburg Research's report was released on Jan. 24. Shares of Adani Green Energy, Adani Total Gas Ltd (ADAG.NS), Adani Power (ADAN.NS) were down 5%, while Adani Transmission rose 3.5%. The group's flagship company, Adani Enterprises Ltd (ADEL.NS), was up 9.5% and Adani Wilmar (ADAW.NS) gained 5%.

☆ Gautam Adani lost half his wealth in a flash. Here’s what happened
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-04 | by ( Julia Horowitz | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

While the Adani Group has condemned the report as “baseless” and “malicious,” investor questions about its claims linger, and the fallout is growing. Gautam Adani is a 60-year-old tycoon who founded the Adani Group more than 30 years ago. The firm said it had taken a short position in Adani Group companies, meaning it would benefit from a drop in their value. Stocks of most Adani Group companies slumped again on Friday. Indian banks that hold Adani Group assets could also be affected if the value of those holdings continues to drop.

☆ India's Gandhi ends 135-day march to revive Congress party in snowy Kashmir
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Fayaz Bukhari | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

"All secular parties must come together to liberate the country from BJP," D. Raja, General Secretary of the Communist Party of India, said at the rally. Several other opposition leaders failed to make it to the rally because flights into Srinagar's airport were cancelled due to the heavy snow. The Nehru-Gandhi dynasty has controlled the Congress party for decades but has also overseen its recent decline. Rahul Gandhi resigned as Congress president after the last election. "I am not from the Congress party but want to support the cause Gandhi stands for," Ahmad said.

The stunning market selloff has cast a shadow over Adani Enterprises' secondary share sale that started on Friday. The share sale is being managed by Jefferies, India's SBI Capital Markets, Axis Capital, and ICICI Securities among others. Shares of other listed Adani firms also plummeted, with Adani Transmission Ltd (ADAI.NS), Adani Total Gas (ADAG.NS), Adani Green Energy (ADNA.NS) and Adani Ports (APSE.NS) sinking 20% each. Adani Ports, Adani Green Energy and Adani Transmission marked their worst intraday drop ever, with heavy volumes. Billionaire U.S. investor Bill Ackman said on Thursday that he found the Hindenburg report "highly credible and extremely well researched."

Adani, whose home state is Gujarat in western India, built his business empire from scratch after starting as a commodities trader. Adani's business empire grew rapidly and his wealth ballooned. In recent years, the $220 billion Adani Group empire has attracted foreign investment - France's TotalEnergies (TTEF.PA), for example, partnered with Adani last year to develop the world's biggest green hydrogen ecosystem. It is not known what was discussed and Adani Group did not respond to a request for comment on Friday. Adani Group's consolidated gross debt stands at $23.34 billion, Jefferies says.

☆ Six injured in Jammu blasts before India opposition leader Gandhi arrives
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-21 | by ( Fayaz Bukhari | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Modi wants to take control of India's part of the Muslim-majority Himalayan region of Jammu and Kashmir, hotly contested by Muslim-majority Pakistan. Gandhi's march, which has been better received by the public than expected, is expected to culminate in Srinagar later this month. The first blast occurred around 0445 GMT, followed by another explosion, said another police official, who asked not be named because he is not authorised to speak to the media. Jaswinder Singh, who saw the first blast, said it occurred in a vehicle that was sent to a workshop for repairs. “There was a big bang and when I came out, I saw a blast had ripped apart a car.

☆ Despite India's economic growth, few jobs and meagre pay for urban youth
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Manoj Kumar | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

He has since remained unemployed, unable to pay back a 100,000 rupee ($1,224) loan he took to buy a two-wheeler scooter. The rising unemployment in India belies other indicators suggesting the economy is undergoing a healthy rebound from the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, the surge in people looking for work, many of them rural migrants, raises concerns about consumption and longer term growth prospects. The urban unemployment rate swelled to 10.1% in December, although the total number of jobs in India touched a pre-pandemic level of 410 million, data compiled by Mumbai-based think-tank Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) showed. Urban unemployment spiked during the pandemic years, largely because of lockdowns, but before that it hovered between 6%-7%, according to CMIE data.

☆ India's jobless rate rises to 16-month high of 8.30% in Dec - CMIE
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-01 | by ( Manoj Kumar | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW DELHI, Jan 1 (Reuters) - India's unemployment rate rose to 8.30% in December, the highest in 16 months, from 8.00% in the previous month, data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) showed on Sunday. The urban unemployment rate rose to 10.09% in December from 8.96% in the previous month, while the rural unemployment rate slipped to 7.44% from 7.55%, the data showed. "Most importantly, the employment rate has increased in December to 37.1%, which again is the highest since January 2022," he told Reuters. The unemployment rate had declined to 7.2% in the July-September quarter compared to 7.6% in the previous quarter, according to separate quarterly data compiled by state run National Statistical Office (NSO) and released in November. In December, the unemployment rate rose to 37.4% in the northern state of Haryana, followed by 28.5% in Rajasthan and 20.8% in Delhi, CMIE data showed.

The free food programme, however, cost the government around $47 billion, worsened the fiscal deficit and reduced wheat stocks in government warehouses to multi-year lows. The government expects to save nearly $20 billion a year by ending the COVID free food scheme. MODI TRUSTED BY VOTERSSome economists had wanted the food programme gone months ago as COVID curbs eased. Had the trust not been there, and for any other leader, it would have been difficult to end such a food programme ahead of elections." But senior BJP leader and former minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said that the decision to reduce food aid should not be linked to elections or politics.

☆ Nepal's 'fierce' ex-guerrilla chief becomes new prime minister
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-25 | by ( Gopal Sharma | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Prachanda, who replaces Sher Bahadur Deuba of the Nepali Congress party, will step down in 2025, making way for the UML to take over the office, local media reported. Remaining work of distribution of key other posts and ministries is still to be worked out," Dev Gurung, the general secretary of Prachanda's Maoist Centre party told Reuters after a meeting of the new coalition. The new coalition comes to power hours after Prachanda,68, surprisingly walked out of the ruling alliance led by Deuba of the Nepali Congress party. Deuba and Prachanda had both campaigned in the November election pledging to keep the old alliance intact for several years. The Nepali Congress party will be the main opposition controlling 89 seats.

☆ Rahul Gandhi's cross-India march reaches capital city Delhi
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-24 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

REUTERS/Anushree FadnavisNEW DELHI, Dec 24 (Reuters) - A cross-country march led by Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi reached the capital New Delhi on Saturday, hoping to regain some of the popularity it lost to the ruling Hindu-nationalist party. Gandhi's mother, former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, party leader Priyanka Gandhi and her husband Robert Vadra joined Saturday's march. The Nehru-Gandhi dynasty has controlled the Congress party for decades but has also overseen its recent decline. Rahul Gandhi resigned as Congress president after the last election. The "Unite India Rally" march began in September in the coastal town of Kanyakumari on the southern tip of India.

☆ Billionaire Adani to control nearly 65% of NDTV as founders sell stake
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-23 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

The husband-and-wife team will sell a 27.26% stake in NDTV to Adani-owned entity AMG Media Network and retain a combined 5%, regulatory filings by NDTV showed on Friday. "The AMG Media Network, after the recent open offer, is now the single largest shareholder in NDTV. Consequently, with mutual agreement we have decided to divest most of our shares in NDTV to the AMG Media Network," the founders said in a statement. Ravish Kumar, a senior executive editor of NDTV, resigned soon after Adani acquired the entity backed by NDTV's founders. Founded in 1988 and owned by the husband-and-wife team, NDTV had previously said that the move by Adani "was executed without any input from, conversation with, or consent of the NDTV founders".

☆ India to step up COVID surveillance as cases increase elsewhere
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-21 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW DELHI, Dec 21 (Reuters) - India's government has asked all states to step up surveillance for any new variants of the coronavirus, citing an increase in COVID-19 cases in China and elsewhere. India has reported the most COVID cases in the world after the United States but its tally of confirmed infections has fallen sharply in the past few months. A recent surge of infections in neighbouring China after it ended its strict COVID restrictions has led to concern that new variants could emerge. Data from the World Health Organization shows that infections have inched up in Japan, Korea, the United States, France and Brazil in recent days. The government has asked all states to ensure that samples of all positive cases are sent to the 54 designated genome sequencing laboratories.

☆ Modi's party set for landslide election win in India's Gujarat state
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-08 | by ( Sumit Khanna | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/3] India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi waves to his supporters as he arrives to cast his vote during the second and last phase of Gujarat state assembly elections in Ahmedabad, India, December 5, 2022. The western industrial state is a bastion of the BJP, which has not lost state assembly elections there since 1995. Modi was Gujarat's chief minister for 13 years before becoming prime minister in 2014. The party was also set to surpass its best results in Gujarat when it won 127 seats in 2002. He is eyeing a third term as prime minister in 2024 and campaigned extensively across the state in the run up to the Gujarat vote.

☆ Cyberattack on top Indian hospital highlights security risk
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-07 | by ( Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

NEW DELHI — The leading hospital in India’s capital limped back to normalcy on Wednesday after a cyberattack crippled its operations for nearly two weeks. Online registration of patients resumed Tuesday after the hospital was able to access its server and recover lost data. The attack was followed by a series of failed attempts to hack India’s top medical research organization, the Indian Council of Medical Research. “We are digitizing (everything), but then there is an attack on the country’s most important medical institute,” he said. Altaf Qadri / APOn Nov. 30, there were repeated but ultimately unsuccessful attempts to breach the website of the Indian Council of Medical Research, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.

☆ Cyril Ramaphosa facing impeachment calls
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-01 | by ( David Mckenzie | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

Johannesburg CNN —South African president Cyril Ramaphosa is facing calls to step down from opposition leaders and even senior figures in his ruling African National Congress party after an independent panel found there is initial evidence that he could have violated his oath of office. President Ramaphosa most likely did breach a number of Constitutional provisions and has a case to answer. The panel was appointed by the speaker of parliament after a motion from a smaller opposition party. The National Assembly will consider the report and may institute impeachment proceedings – though the ANC does hold a majority of seats. Ramaphosa took office after his predecessor Jacob Zuma was forced to resign because of multiple allegations of Corruption.

☆ Modi's home state Gujarat votes, seen as easy mid-term test for India's leader
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-01 | by ( Sumit Khanna | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Opinion polls conducted in the lead-up to the Gujarat polls projected the BJP to comfortably retain power in the state. In the last state election five years ago, the BJP won 99 seats in the 182-member assembly while Congress got 77. The BJP is expected to win between 131 to 139 seats this time, ABP-CVoter projected in November. Congress could win 31 to 39 seats while the Aam Aadmi Party could bag up to 15. According to India TV-Matrize opinion poll, also conducted in November, the BJP may win up to 119 seats.

☆ Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Gujarat State Heads to the Polls
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-29 | by ( Shan Li | Krishna Pokharel | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

GANDHINAGAR, INDIA—Gujarat, the home state of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi , will vote in state assembly elections starting this week, offering a barometer of the endurance of Mr. Modi’s personal appeal ahead of national elections in 2024 in which he will run for a third term. The Bharatiya Janata Party has ruled in the western coastal state for 27 years, and there is little doubt of another victory, but the party is leaving little to chance after a surprisingly tough challenge from its rival, the Indian National Congress Party, in 2017. Top BJP leaders were also stung by the party’s defeat in West Bengal last year after it poured money and resources into winning state elections there, analysts said.

☆ Takeover of NDTV a 'responsibility', says India's richest man Adani - FT
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-25 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

The ports-to-energy conglomerate run by Adani, Asia's richest person, unveiled plans late in August to acquire a majority stake in NDTV, seen as a bastion of independent media. Founded in 1988 and owned by husband-and-wife team Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy, NDTV previously said that the move by Adani Group "was executed without any input from, conversation with, or consent of the NDTV founders". "Independence means if government has done something wrong, you say it's wrong," Adani said in the FT interview. Adani added that he has invited NDTV's owner-founder Prannoy Roy to remain as chair when the acquisition is completed. NDTV's business rivals include Times Group's Times Now and Network18's CNN-News18, controlled by Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani.

☆ Nepal's ruling party seen emerging as the single largest in elections
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-23 | by ( Gopal Sharma | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

The Nepali Congress of Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba has won 13 of 22 results declared, with three each going to the main opposition Nepal Communist Unified Marxist-Leninist (UML) party and the newly formed National Independent Party (NIP). A five-time prime minister, Deuba won his remote Dadeldhura constituency for the seventh straight time since 1991. The Maoist Centre, a dominant partner in the ruling coalition, is leading in 14 seats and has won just two seat in the parliament. But final results could be about 10 days away, as election officials need to count millions of paper ballots manually. read moreThe Nepali Congress party is seen as pro-India, while the UML is considered closer to China.

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