13.01.2008

• Noted something about a new concept TIPS, in our Discover It blog. Look at it here.
• Hire and fire may get official nod
• This is one measure that is seen by the MNCs and private sector largely as one of the key components of labour reform in India.
• The government has been working on a formula whereby employers would be able to hand over pink slips to the workers after suitably compensating them. The compensation would be fixed somewhere between 45 and 90 days of salary.
• The industry bodies such as CII, FICCI and ASSOCHAM have been asked to submit the maximum compensation package that the employers would be willing to extend.
• The unions have reportedly communicated their support for 90 day salary compensation.
• As the Left is likely to oppose this policy, the government is expected to extend this to the unorganized sector, which comprises 92% of the total work force in the country.
• Tata’s Nano is likely to keep making news and waves in the days if not years to come
• Ratan Tata is billed as the only person (in private sector, that is) after Henry Ford to think of affordable no-frills mobility solution for the man on the street and actually be able to pull it off.
• US dumping measure hits WTO roadblock
• Remember the ‘zeroing’ controversy? Look what we noted on this earlier.
• Now it is the turn of Japan to question this by asking the WTO to permit it to slap up to $250 mn in extra duties and tariffs on US goods to retaliate for the way US has been setting its anti-dumping duties on imports.
• Zeroing refers to the practice of looking only at imports priced at a lower level than in their home markets and ignoring (or zeroing) similar products that actually cost more at home, when making comparison to establish the level of dumping.
• Indian duty free shops left high and dry by the government
• Remember the controversy about this? Look at what we noted on this earlier.
• Now the government of India has refused to approach the EC (European Commission) for verification of Indian airports, citing security concerns. Had the government allowed an inspection by the EU of the security processes in place in our airports, it would have lifted the ban on passengers flying out of these airports carrying LAGs (Liquids, Aerosols and Gels) over 100 ml. That lifting of the ban would have helped our Rs. 300 crore duty free shopping market.
• Tourist arrivals in India
• India is witnessing robust tourist arrivals over the last couple of years.
• 2007: 5 mn ; 2006: 4.45 mn.
• The foreign exchange earnings from them also have been jumping by leaps and bounds. 2007: $12 bn; 2006: $9 bn; 2005: $5.73 bn.
• Domestic tourists number about 460 mn last year.
• Government may scale down tax sops for the renewable energy sector
• The Planning Commission and the Finance Ministry have been opposing the scheme under which 80% depreciation of the renewable energy devices is exempted from income tax. It is seen that this facility is being used largely as a tax incentive than producing additional energy. Under this scheme, the loss in renewable energy business can be set off against the profit of another business owned by the same entrepreneur.
• Despite the incentive, the generation of wind and biomass power stands at a mere 7660 MW and 560 MW respectively.
• More are Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay
• The Himalayan Mountaineering Institute was set up in 1954. Tenzing Norgay was associated with it since then till he died in 1986.
• Edmund Hillary accompanied Neil Armstrong in 1985 in a small twin-engined ski plane over the Arctic Ocean and landed at the North Pole.
• The sons of Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary – Jamling Norgay and Peter Hillary, have together climbed Mount Everest in 2003 as part of the 50^th anniversary celebrations of the conquest by their fathers.
• Marion Jones gets 6 months jail
• The fallen sport star got the jail term for lying about steroid use and involvement in drugs fraud case.
• ISRO plans to launch satellite to study the sun
• It is called “Aditya” and weighs about 100 kg.
• It should be up in space by 2012 to study the dynamic solar corona, the outermost region of the sun. This region has temperatures of over one mn degrees, with solar winds that reach a velocity of up to 1000 km a second. The corona releases energy during solar flares in the form of bursts – manifesting in geomagnetic storms on earth.
• The satellite will carry as its payload an advanced solar coronagraph.
• It will be placed in the near earth orbit of 600 km.
• The launch of the satellite will coincide with the ‘solar maximum’, a phase of high solar dynamism, which will occur once in 11 years. The ‘solar minimum’ occurred in 2006.
• Know anything about Smiths Cloud?
• Read about it in full here.
• It is a gaseous cloud (mostly Hydrogen) which is 11,000 light years long and 2500 light years wide that is travelling towards our Milky Way galaxy. It is expected to collide with our galaxy in about 40 mn years.
• What a short time? What amazes about astronomy is that it makes all our present day problems / issues look so silly and a waste of time. Why bother about rising temperatures in 50 years? Does it make any sense? 50 years is just a blip. By the way look at a good piece shared by my friend Vinod in today’s Time Pass. It is also about ‘time’ and makes a billion look so small.