Over 38,000 doctors volunteer to join fight against COVID-19

Mumbai, Mar 6: A Rolls Royce car, paintings of famous artists M F Hussain and Amrita Sher-Gil, designer handbags and other luxury items belonging to fugitive diamond jeweller Nirav Modi garnered over Rs 51 crore in the second auction conducted on Thursday.

As many as 40 items went under the hammer on Thursday, which marks the completion of auction of assets seized by the Enforcement Directorate.

The auction was conducted by Saffronart on behalf of the deputy director, Enforcement Directorate, and was expected to garner a minimum of Rs 40 crore in proceeds.

A collection of 112 prized assets of Modi were put up for live and online auctions from March 3 to 5, which included major artworks by contemporary and modern Indian artists, designer handbags, luxury watches and cars.

While the online auction on March 3-4 garnered Rs 2.04 crore against the expected proceeds of Rs 52 lakh, the live auction on Thursday garnered Rs 51.41 crore more.

These assets, seized by the ED, were put on auction in an attempt to recover a part of the dues Modi owes to various banks.

According to officials from Saffronart, the ED would get Rs 53.45 crore from the proceeds of these two auctions.

The lots that went under the hammer included legendary painter MF Hussain's painting of 'Battle of Ganga and Jamuna- Mahabharata 12' which went for a record 12 crore, the highest price received so far for the painter's work.

Amrita Sher-Gil's rare 1935 painting 'Boys with Lemons', which was auctioned for the first time, sold for Rs 15.7 crore ($2.24 million).

V S Gaitonde's tranquil 1972 painting was sold for Rs 9.52 crore while Manjit Bawa's Untitled 1992 sold for Rs 6.16 crore. Modi's Rolls Royce Ghost witnessed a high demand, selling for twice its estimate at Rs 1.68 crore ($240,000).

New Delhi, Jan 13: Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, has fired around 50 of its India executives as part of its restructuring in the country, three sources with direct knowledge said.

The move underscores the struggles Walmart has faced in expanding its wholesale business in India. The Bentonville, Arkansas based company currently operates 28 wholesale stores where it sells goods to small shopkeepers, and not to retail consumers.

The firings mostly affected executives in the company’s real estate division because the growth in the wholesale model has not been that robust, two of the sources said.

“It’s happening because focus is shifting to e-commerce rather than physical (stores),” said one source, who declined to be identified as the decision is not public.

Walmart did not respond to a request for comment.

Walmart has placed bold bets on India’s e-commerce sector. In 2018, it paid $16 billion to acquire a majority stake in India’s online marketplace Flipkart, in its biggest global acquisition.

The second source added that while Walmart could slow down the pace of opening new wholesale stores, the focus will increasingly be on boosting sales through business-to-business and retail e-commerce.

Some of the executives were sacked last week and more could be let go on Monday, two sources said.

In a statement to India’s Economic Times newspaper, which first reported the news, Walmart said it was always looking for ways to operate more effectively and that “this requires us to review our corporate structure to ensure that we are organized in the right way to best meet the needs of our members.”

Walmart has around 600 staff in its India head office out of a total of around 5,300 nationally, one of the sources said.

New Delhi, Jun 28: With 19,906 new cases, highest single-day spike so far, India's COVID-19 count touched 5,28,859 including 2,03,051 active cases, 3,09,713 cured/discharged/migrated, according to the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare.

410 deaths were reported in the last 24 hours and the cumulative toll reached 16,095 deaths.

Coronavirus cases in Maharashtra have climbed to 1,59,133 while Delhi's tally stands at 80,188.

2,31,095 samples were tested yesterday and the total number of samples tested up to 27 June is 82,27,802, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).