Aadhaar rivals growth of Windows, Android, Facebook: Satya Nadella

Agencies
September 26, 2017

Orlando, Sept 26: Aadhaar's identity system rivals the growth of other platform innovations like Windows, Android or Facebook, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has said.

Nadella, in his book 'Hit Refresh', which was released during the ongoing Microsoft Ignite 2017 conference, has praised India's leap forward in the digital and technological arena.

"Aadhaar now has scaled to over one billion people, rivaling the growth of other platform innovations such as Windows, Android or Facebook," the 50-year-old wrote in his book that hit the book stores today.

He praised the creation of the new digital ecosystem IndiaStack.

IndiaStack is a set of APIs (application programming interface) that allows governments, businesses, startups and developers to utilise an unique digital Infrastructure to solve India's hard problems towards presence-less, paperless, and cashless service delivery.

"China strategically used the global supply chain and their own domestic market to amplify their comparative advantage and bootstrap their economic growth," the India-born CEO noted.

"The combination of industrial policy, public sector investment, and entrepreneurial energy is what many other countries will also look to replicate from China's success. I see the beginnings of this in India with the creation of the new digital ecosystem known as IndiaStack," Nadella said.

"India is leapfrogging from once being an infrastructure-poor country to now leading in digital technology. IndiaStack ushers in a presence-less, cashless, paperless economy for all its citizens," said the Indian American CEO from Microsoft.

In his book, Nadella wrote that on a trip to Bengaluru he engaged in a conversation with Nandan Nilekani about IndiaStack and its future road map.

"Nandan is the legendary founder of Infosys, who went on to create a new startup working with the Indian Government- Aadhaar-the identity system that is at the center of IndiaStack," he said.

Nadella has also mentioned about Enlightiks, a startup that was acquired by Practo, a leading e-health company in India.

"I met the founder of Enlightiks on the same trip to Bengaluru. They are using the latest cloud technology and AI from Microsoft to create a state-of-the-art health care diagnostics service that can, for example, detect an Atrial fibrillation event before it happens because of the rich data going from the personal device of the patient directly to the cloud," he said.

"In turn, this cloud service can be made available to hospitals in Smaller towns or rural areas in India. Enlightiks also has plans to take advantage of IndiaStack to authenticate the user, accept payment, create portal medical records, and much more. This Indian innovation is now looking to expand in the US, Africa and everywhere else," he wrote.

According to Nadella, this dynamic is not unique to China or India.

"I saw this across Chile, Indonesia, and Poland, and also in France, Germany, and Japan. Reflecting on my earlier visit to Egypt, it's clear they are investing in human capital," he said.

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Agencies
February 29,2020

Ahmedabad, Feb 29: The presence of two feral pigeons onboard a GoAir flight at the airport in Ahmedabad in Gujarat created a flutter among the amused passengers, even though the avian surprise did not lead to any untoward incident or delay in the flight.

The incident took place on Friday when the passengers were boarding the Ahmedabad-Jaipur flight.

"Two pigeons had found their way inside the flight G8 702 while the passengers were boarding," an airline statement said on Saturday.

"The crew immediately shooed away the birds. The flight took off at its scheduled time at 5 p.m.," it added.

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Agencies
March 21,2020

The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Saturday launched a Health Alert on WhatsApp where over 1.5 billion users can ask questions and they will be provided with reliable information about new coronavirus 24/7.

This will also serve government decision-makers by providing the latest numbers and situation reports, WhatsApp said in a statement.

To contact the WHO Health Alert, save the number +41 79 893 1892 in phone contacts, and then simply text the word 'Hi' in a WhatsApp message to get started.

The service responds to a series of prompts and will be updated daily with the latest information.

"You can also visit the WhatsApp Coronavirus Information Hub at whatsapp.com/coronavirus," and click on the WHO link on the homepage to open up a chat with the WHO Health Alert if you have WhatsApp installed," said the micro-blogging platform.

The WHO Health Alert will provide official information on topics such as how to protect yourself from infection, travel advice, and debunking new coronavirus myths.

The service is initially launching in English but will be available in all six languages within the coming weeks (English, Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian and Spanish.)

"Digital technology gives us an unprecedented opportunity for vital health information to go viral and spread faster than the pandemic. We are proud to have partners like Facebook and WhatsApp, that are supporting us in reaching billions of people with important health information," said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO.

The WHO Health Alert is the latest official NGO or government helpline to become available on WhatsApp, joining the Singapore Government, The Israel Ministry of Health, the South Africa Department of Health, and KOMINFO Indonesia.

Earlier this week, WhatsApp, in partnership with the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and UNDP, launched the WhatsApp Coronavirus Information Hub. The hub offers general tips and resources for users around the world to reduce the spread of rumours and connect with accurate health information.

WhatsApp also announced a $1 million grant to the International Fact Checking Network to support fact-checking for the #CoronaVirusFacts Alliance.

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Agencies
July 13,2020

New Delhi, Jul 13: The Income Tax Department has facilitated a new functionality for banks and post offices to ascertain TDS applicability rates on cash withdrawal of above Rs 20 lakh in case of a non-filer of the income-tax return and that of above Rs 1 crore in case of a filer of the income-tax return.

In a statement, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said that now banks and post offices have to only enter the PAN of the person who is withdrawing cash for ascertaining the applicable rate of TDS.

So far, more than 53,000 verification requests have been executed successfully on this facility, a statement by the CBDT said.

"CBDT today said that this functionality available as 'Verification of applicability u/s 194N' on www.incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in since 1st July 2020, is also made available to the Banks through web-services so that the entire process can be automated and be linked to the Bank's internal core banking solution," it said.

On entering PAN by the bank or the post office, a message will be instantly displayed on the departmental utility: "TDS is deductible at the rate of 2 per cent if cash withdrawal exceeds Rs 1 crore", in case the person withdrawing cash is a filer of the income-tax return.

In case the person withdrawing cash is a non-filer of income tax return, the message shown would be: "TDS is deductible at the rate of 2 per cent if cash withdrawal exceeds Rs 20 lakh and at the rate of 5 per cent if it exceeds Rs 1 crore."

The CBDT said that the data on cash withdrawal indicated that huge amount of cash is withdrawn by the persons who have never filed income-tax returns.

To ensure filing of return by these persons and to keep track on cash withdrawals by the non-filers, and to curb black money, the Finance Act, 2020 with effect from July 1, 2020 further amended IT Act to lower threshold of cash withdrawal to Rs 20 lakh for the applicability of this TDS for the non-filers and also mandated TDS at the higher rate of 5 per cent on cash withdrawal exceeding Rs 1 crore by the non-filers.

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