Bommai also asked businessmen to come for a discussion about the proposed GST on food grains, assuring them to take a positive step in this regard

Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Saturday said that the state government would introduce an employment policy, while the draft research and development (R&D) policy would be tabled at the next Cabinet meeting. “Under the employment policy, industries that create more jobs would be given more incentives. Karnataka would also be the first state to have an R&D policy,” he said. Speaking after inaugurating the conference of district chambers of commerce and industry, he assured to take steps to resolve the issue of double taxation at industrial areas. “Will will bring single taxation, and self-assessment of tax will also be introduced for industries,” he noted. “Four airstrips and six townships linked with industries would be developed in the State,” he added. “Investments that have been Bengaluru-centric, should flow towards Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, for balanced growth. The government has brought several reforms to boost industrial growth, while high-tech industries in Tier 2 cities would be encouraged,” he said.Show affection to Congress, not me: D K Shivakumar to followers

He made the comment in response to a query about former CM Siddaramaiah’s birthday celebration

Karnataka’s Congress state unit president D K Shivakumar said on Thursday that his well-wishers should show their affection to the Congress party, not him. Shivakumar, who was in the national capital to attend a party leaders’ meeting on Congress’s Bharat Jodo Yatra programme, told media persons: “I am not interested in celebrating (my) birthday. All my appeal to my well-wishers is to show their affection to (the) Congress party.” He made the comment in response to a query about former chief minister Siddaramaiah’s birthday celebration. “Siddaramaiah’s followers wanted to celebrate his birthday, let them do it. But I am not interested in it,” Shivakumar said. “I don’t have any fan following. I am not interested in it also. Don’t bring all these birthday celebration issue(s) to me.” On Bharat Jodo Yatra, he said: “The Yatra will crisscross Karnataka for 21 days, covering over 500 kilometres. The route will be finalised soon. It will enter the state at Gundlupet in Chamarajanagar district from Tamil Nadu.”

92-Year-Old Indian Woman Reaches Pakistan After 75 Years To Visit Ancestral Home

Reena recalled a multi-cultural diverse community that was thriving in Pindi before the partition as she was driven from the border to Rawalpindi.

Reena Chhibar, a 92-year-old Indian woman reached Pakistan through the Wagah-Attari border to see her ancestral home, Prem Niwas, in Rawalpindi on Saturday. She was issued a three-month visa by the Pakistani High Commission as a goodwill gesture, media reports said. As she made her way through the Wagah-Attari border, Reena urged the governments of both the countries to “work together” to ease visa restrictions to make “coming and going easy for us”, reported Express Tribune. Reena recalled a multi-cultural diverse community that was thriving in Pindi before the partition as she was driven from the border to Rawalpindi. “My siblings had friends who would come over to our house from various communities, including Muslims,” she said, remembering that “our house-help was also a diverse mix of people”. In 1947, after the partition, her family moved to India. She was 15 years old at the time, and though over 75 years have passed since then, she said she “could not remove her ancestral home, her neighbourhood and the streets from her heart”, Express Tribune reported. Reena had applied for visa in 1965 to visit Pakistan, but she says she could not acquire permission amid high tensions due to the war between the two neighbours. She still managed to visit Lahore to watch a match between Pakistan and England as Pakistan had issued visas to Indians to watch the match. Reena claims that she had expressed the desire to visit her ancestral home on social media in 2021, upon which a Pakistani citizen named Sajjad Haider contacted her and sent her images of the house. In a video on social media, she claimed that she had applied for a visa to visit the place in 2021 which was rejected, Express Tribune reported.

Sri Lanka Crisis: Potato Over Rs 400 Per KG, Onion Crosses Rs 300!

As the political and economic crisis in Sri Lanka deepens further, supermarkets in the capital city of Colombo are rapidly running out of food and other essential commodities, causing concern and unrest among citizens.

The already skyrocketing prices of eatables in Sri Lanka are touching new highs with each passing day, making it impossible for most of the people in crisis-hit country to buy them. Sri Lanka is grappling with its worst political and economic crisis since its independence in 1948. The prices of vegetables have more than doubled, while the rate of rice has increased from Rs 145 per kilogram a year ago to Rs 220 (Sri Lankan Rupee), according to various news reports. The price of potatoes has crossed the Rs 400-mark, while the rate of onion has shot beyond Rs 300 per Kg. Pulses are being sold at an all-time high of Rs 620, while a litre of coconut oil (commonly used for cooking in Sri Lanka) is priced over Rs 700.

Eyeing Gujarat, Himachal polls, AAP goes with Yashwant Sinha for President

The AAP’s pledge to support Yashwant Sinha would ensure he gets over 4 lakh votes, even as Droupadi Murmu is comfortably poised to sail through the election by expectedly garnering at least 6.60 lakh votes.

After keeping everyone guessing for nearly a month, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Saturday announced its support for the joint Opposition’s candidate Yashwant Sinha in the July 18 Presidential election, infusing some energy in the dispirited Opposition camp whose presidential campaign had seemed to be unravelling. The Delhi Chief Minister and AAP national convenor, Arvind Kejriwal, chaired a meeting of the 11-member AAP Political Affairs Committee (PAC), the party’s highest decision-making body, at his residence during the day, where it was decided that the AAP’s MLAs and MPs will vote for Sinha for the President’s post. On June 21, after declaring Sinha’s candidature, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP)’s supremo Sharad Pawar had told reporters that the AAP, despite staying away from the Opposition’s meetings on the issue, will back the former Union minister in the Presidential poll. The Kejriwal-led party, however, chose not to reveal its cards till the eleventh hour. In fact, when Sinha visited Chandigarh earlier this week as part of his whirlwind tour across states for his campaign, he did not have any meeting with the AAP’s Punjab MLAs, which kept the suspense alive. “The AAP will contest the Assembly polls in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh this year, where the BJP is in power and the Congress is the principal Opposition. It made no sense for the party to give a handle to the Congress to whip up the narrative that AAP is BJP’s B-team,” a senior AAP leader told The Indian Express.

Virat Kohli responds to Babar Azam’s ‘Stay strong’ tweet, says ‘Keep shining’

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