Strip away the politics, and Pakistanis and Indians are basically the same and Covid has sort of proved that, finds a study using artificial intelligence into people’s tweets. What Covid has not done is unite governments and that is Africa’s Lament against Europe that once colonised it and ravaged it before the virus and even against Covax that promised to help them. We can understand China President Xi Jinping is happy and proud of his rule country but he had some real harsh words for everyone else. Your cooking gas is now dearer and Antarctica is even hotter.
CORONAVIRUS NEWS
4️⃣0️⃣0️⃣,0️⃣0️⃣0️⃣ : India’s death toll due to disease crosses this number.
💉Jab Ok: Nine European countries – Austria, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Slovenia, Spain, Iceland and Switzerland – have moved to accept Covishield certificationfrom India. This comes after India said it will ask for mandatory quarantining of people from there if the countries did not accept its certification.
🦠 Not yet: Delta+ variant is not yet a “variant of concern” for WHO as the cases were still low, says its chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan. The WHO will likely take a call on approving Covaxin in the second week of August.
🇵🇰❤️🇮🇳 Pak for India: An Artificial Intelligence-led study into tweets from Pakistan when India suffered its second wave showed that most “prayed” for India.
⬆️ Wave’s On: Cases have begun rising in Europe once again with a more than 10% spike over the last week, says WHO. The Euro 2020 could become a super spreader.
💉➕💉 Mix it: Germany has advised citizens to take either a Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna vaccine after an AstraZeneca vaccine for better protection. The idea is yet to be tested in India.
🐕🐈 Cats n dogs: If you have Covid, best to stay away from pet cats and dogs as the virus can affect them, say scientists from the Netherlands. There is no confirmation that the virus can jump from pets to humans. THIS STUDY IS YET TO UNDERGO SCIENTIFIC SCRUTINY.
😔 Africa’s Lament: African Union has said it is disappointed at the EU that has “not sent a single vaccine dose” to the continent. It also accused the vaccine pooling programme Covax of not being transparent, including on whether donor countries were meeting their obligations.
INDIA NEWS
⛈️ ‘Break Monsoon’: The monsoon continues to be delayed in north India making it the “most delayed” since 2012. New predictions put the date at July 7. Meanwhile, much of the region is suffering heatwaves. Punjab has been forced to cut power to industries.
😶 No Face: Bengaluru Police stops identifying suspects in crimes – leaving out their names and blurring their faces – in press releases. This is due a Karnataka HC order that said police should not reveal their identities before investigation was complete.
⚔️ DroneWars: The Indian Army is developing capabilities to use drones for defence and offence.
👨🏻⚖️ Keep it: The Supreme Court said it will not review its May 5 order that declared the powers to identify socially and educationally backward classes (SEBC) lay with the Centre for giving quotas in jobs and educational institutes. This despite the Centre itself seeking the review.
✋ Politics: In a signal to the Congress High Command against Navjot Singh Sidhu, Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh hosted Hindu leaders for lunch who demanded that the next state party chief be a Hindu, which Sunil Jhakar (the current chief) is.
WORLD NEWS
🇨🇳⚛️ Chinese Expansion: China is reportedly increasing its nuclear arsenal to rival the US. At the moment the country is believed to have around 250 to 350 nukes, just a fifth of what the US has.
🇵🇰🤝🇨🇳 Pakistan PM Imran Khan said he accepts the “Chinese version” of what is happening to Uyghur Muslims and says the West was being hypocritical in not talking about Kashmir where the human rights are “much worse”. He also praised Communist Party’s model of governance as against Western “electoral politics”.
“Anyone who dares try to do that (bully China) will have their heads bashed bloody against the Great Wall of Steel forged by over 1.4 billion Chinese people.”
Xi Jinping, China President during the 100th anniversary celebrations of the Communist Party of China.
🇨🇦 Canada Day: Many cities in the country did not celebrate the day in much fanfare as usual. This is because of the discovery of more than a 1000 graves very close to (mostly former) Catholic schools set up to “assimilate” Indigenous people.
“I apologise for the active involvement of the Amsterdam city council in the commercial system of colonial slavery and the worldwide trade in enslaved people.”
Femke Halsema, Amsterdam Mayor
🇿🇼 Outrage: In Zimbabwe, a 19-year-old who allegedly killed a 40-year-old man who was to sexually assault her has been charged with murder. The case has triggered a debate in the country where activists and lawyers say that the law doesn’t do much to protect women.
🇺🇸 Halt!: The US has put on hold all federal executions till the justice department reviews its capital punishment policy and procedures.
BUSINESS/ECONOMY
🚗 Tesla, Khem Cho?: Gujarat has offered Tesla 1,000 acres to set up a manufacturing unit. But what could turn them off is “no social life”, admits a senior govt official. Maharashtra and Karnataka are also keen. In other news, auto sales are picking up in the country as restrictions ease.
🏢 Life Corporatised: Eight years after the then LIC MD said that the company saw no need to be corporatised (at the time since capital was not an issue), the government has formally corporatised it, in line with the Financial Act, 2021. An IPO may be coming up soon.
“To say telecom industry is in a bit of trouble is actually an understatement. It is in a tremendous amount of stress… 10 operators gone out of business, two merged… how long can you keep killing each other?… Just bring it (tariffs) back to where it was.”
Sunil Mittal, Bharti Group chairperson
🍳 Sizzling: LPG prices rises Rs 25 per domestic cylinder, Rs 76 per commercial cylinder.
💵 Tax correction: Around 130 countries, members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) agreed for a global tax overhaul that included a proposal to tax MNC, including Big Tech, on where they make their business and not just where they are based out of. This had been accepted in June’s G-7 meeting.
👩🦰👱♀️👩🦱✊ Safety Online: Over 200 high-profile women have written to the CEOs of Facebook, Google, TikTok and Twitter that they must find a way to protect women from online abuse. The signatories include actor Emma Watson, former tennis player Billie Jean King and former Australia PM Julia Gillard.
💵🏄 More balance: According to a survey, 84% Indians who only WFH feel more loyalty to employer; 42% of those who were hit by Covid-19 plan to change their employer and of the 10 most attractive companies that employees find attractive, only four are Indian – TCS, Wipro, Infosys and Tata Steel.
ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE & TECH
🐻❄️ Climate Change: There is a region of ice in the Arctic that was said to last longer than the rest in the face of climate change – literally called the “Last Ice Area”, and hence provide refuge to a number of mammals, including polar bears. A new study finds that this region too suffered record melting in the summer.
🛰️ Hope on Mars: The Red Planet has auroras and the UAE’s Hope mission has found it.
Artist impression 
Artist impression 
What Hope captured 
Artist Impression
💫🍴 Star Eater: Scientists find evidence of a black hole and a “dead” star (called neutron star) colliding and creating gravitational waves that stretches space and time.
🧊♨️ Freeze no more: Antarctica is the latest to join the list of “fastest warming regions” rising 3 deg C over 50 years, according to the UN.
NEWS OF YESTERDAY
US President Lyndon B Johnson signed into law the Civil Rights Act that allowed for integration of African Americans and equal voting rights, on this day in 1964.
News Of Today 