Income Tax sops in budget; air travel, health check-up to be costlier

A play-safe budget on Monday raised the threshold income tax exemption limit from Rs 1.60 lakh to Rs 1.80 lakh that will leave at least Rs 2000 more in the hands of tax payers across the board and made changes in the service tax that will make air travel, hotel accommodation and drinking in AC restaurants costlier.

Presenting the budget for 2011—12 that will result in a net revenue loss of Rs 200 crore, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee imposed an excise duty of one per cent on 130 specified items which will, however, exempt food and fuel.

He also gave some relief to corporates by reducing the current income tax surcharge of 7.5 per cent on domestic companies to five per cent but raised the Minimum Alternate Tax (MAT) from 18 to 18.5 per cent including developers of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in it.

While leaving the rest of exemption slabs, surcharge and cess on income tax untouched, he reduced the qualifying age of senior citizens from 65 to 60 years, raised their exemption limit from Rs 2.40 lakh to Rs 2.50 lakh. No special benefit was announced for women whose basic exemption limit remains at Rs 1.90 lakh.

Mr. Mukherjee also created a new category of “Very Senior Citizens” of 80 years and above who will be eligible for a higher exemption limit of Rs five lakhs.

Service tax

The budget sought to widen the ambit of the service tax net by which hotel accommodation above Rs 1,000 a day and AC restaurants that serve liquor will be included.

The scope of life insurance service is being widened to cover all services provided to any person by an insurer and legal services provided by business entity to individuals and individuals to entities but not individuals to individuals.

Opposition parties flayed the budget saying it was very “disappointing and direction less” while the industry welcomed it as “positive and growth oriented“.

Hailing the “commendable job” done by his Finance Minister, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the signals are that this is a government which is reform oriented but admitted “you cannot please all people“.

Diagnostic services

All services including diagnostic services provided by AC clinical establishments with more than 25 beds and services provided by a doctor who owns such establishments have been brought under the service tax net.

Economy class domestic travel by air will cost Rs 50 more while international travel will cost Rs 250 more. Higher class domestic travel by air attract a standard 10 per cent service tax bringing it on par with international higher class travel.

While direct tax changes are expected to result in a revenue loss of Rs 11,500 crore, the net revenue gain on account of indirect taxes is likely to be Rs 11,300 crore, including an additional Rs 4,000 crore on account of service tax changes.

Food stuff

Prepared food stuff like sugar confectionery, pastry and cakes, starches, paper and articles of paper, textile goods, drugs and medicinal equipment will become costlier with increase in the concessional rate of excise duty from four per cent to five per cent.

Ready made garments and branded textile made ups will also become costlier with the levy of mandatory 10 per cent excise duty. Exemptions from excise duty is being withdrawn on micro processor for computers, floppy and hard disc drive, CD—Rom drive, DVD drives and writers making it costlier but they will attract only five per cent concessional duty.

Sanitary napkins

Items that will become cheaper are sanitary napkins, baby and clinical diapers and adult diapers with reduction of excise duty, factory built ambulances, precious metals including gold and silver. However, one per cent excise duty is being imposed on branded jewellery and branded articles of precious metals.

The Budget for next year pegs the fiscal deficit at 4.6 per cent of GDP for 2011—12 which works out to Rs 4,12,817 crore. Gross tax receipts are estimated at Rs 9,32,440 crore, an increase of 24.9 per cent over the Budget Estimates for 2010—11.

Net non—tax revenue receipts for the next financial year are estimated Rs 1,25,435 crore. The total expenditure proposed for 2011—12 is Rs 12,57,729 crore. Plan expenditure will be Rs 4,41,547 crore, an increase of 18 per cent and non—Plan expenditure will be Rs 8,16,182 crore, an increase of 10.9 per cent over Budget estimates of 2010—11.

Defence

Defence expenditure for the next year has been pegged at Rs 1,64,415, an increase of Rs 17,071 crore over the last financial year. This includes a capital expenditure of Rs 69,199 crore.

“Needless to say, any further requirement for the country’s defence would be met,” Mukherjee said.

The Budget has raised allocation for social sector spending by 17 per cent to Rs 1,60,887 crore and the allocation for Bharat Nirman programme by Rs 10,000 crore.

Allocation for infrastructure has been increased by over 23 per cent to Rs 2,14,000 crore and the credit to farmers hiked by Rs 1 lakh crore to Rs 4,75,000 crore.

The Budget assumes open market borrowing of Rs 3.43 lakh crore. Extension of nutrient—based subsidy to cover urea is under active consideration.

In a boost to housing sector finance, the Budget continued the scheme of interest subvention of one per cent on housing loans and liberalised it by extending it up to Rs 25 lakh from the present Rs 10 and Rs 15 respectively.

GST

The Finance Minister also proposed various measures to achieve a closer fit between the present Service Tax regime and its successor Goods and Services Tax (GST).

The Minister announced a broad set of financial sector reforms, saying he proposed to move the legislations relating to insurance laws, LIC, revised pension fund bill, banking laws amendment bill, State Bank of India Subsidiaries Bill and a bill on Factoring and Assignment of Receivables.

Kerosene, LPG

In an effort to curb diversion of subsidised items like kerosene, LPG and fertilisers, the Budget proposes to introduce from March next year a scheme that will move towards direct transfer of cash subsidy to people living below poverty line (BPL).

On the much—speculated roll—back of stimulus measures implemented three years ago in the midst of global financial crisis, Mr. Mukherjee said a counter—cyclical fiscal policy is required for insurance against external shocks and localised domestic factors.

Aiming towards fiscal consolidation, the government proposes to introduce an amendment to Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act, laying down the fiscal roadmap for the next five years.

The Finance Minister also proposed to introduce the Public Debt Management Agency of India Bill in Parliament in the next year.

FDI

In a bid to make the Foreign Direct Investment policy more user—friendly, Mr. Mukherjee said discussions are underway to further liberalise the policy.

To liberalise the portfolio investment route, it has been decided to permit SEBI registered mutual funds to accept subscriptions from foreign investors for equity schemes which will enable Indian mutual funds to have direct access to foreign investors.

To enhance the flow of funds to the infrastructure sector, the FII limit for investment in corporate bonds, with residual maturity of over five years issued by companies in infrastructure is being raised by an additional limit of USD 20 billion taking the limit to USD 25 billion.

This will raise the total limit for FIIs investment to corporate bonds to USD 40 billion.

Pioneer of atom bomb dies

Zhu Guangya, a nuclear physicist whose pioneering research contributed to the development of China's first atom and hydrogen bombs in the 1960s, died Saturday at age 87 in Beijing.

Zhu's long career covered several decades including stints as a senior academician at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering. He served as vice chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, China's top political advisory body, between 1994 and 2003.

Zhu Guangya's son, Zhu Mingyuan, told the Global Times Sunday that he admired his father's attitude to his work the most.

"His colleagues said they had never met someone like my father who was so serious and careful with his work," Zhu Mingyuan said Sunday. "He would rectify any wrong characters and punctuations while reading a document."

The son said his father's students would carry on his work and mission.

Zhu was born in Yichang, Hubei Province in 1924 and later moved to Wuhan with his family. He developed an interest in physics in high school and was recommended to the physics department at Southwest Associated University (SAU) in Kunming, Yunnan Province, the best university during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1937-45).

In the fall of 1945, the US military indicated they would not object to China making its own atom bomb.

Facebook, Twitter play role in college admissions

College admissions officials look up applicants on Facebook and Twitter, experts say. Details revealed through social media can make or break a good impression.
February 26, 2011|By Tiffany Hsu, Los Angeles Times

Tools for getting into college: GPA, SAT — and Facebook?

The website StudentAdvisor reports at least one case of an applicant being rejected because of something in his or her social media profile.

US hookers flocking to Facebook to advertise services Read more: US hookers flocking to Facebook to advertise services - The Times of India http://ti

NEW YORK: A sociologist in the US has revealed that the number of hookers advertising their services on social networking site Facebook is on the rise.

Columbia University sociologist Sudhir Venkatesh studied the habits of 290 sex workers in New York and found that 83 per cent rely on Facebook to lure customers.

"I estimate that by the end of 2011, Facebook will be the leading online recruitment space," the New York Daily News quoted Venkatesh as writing in the February issue of Wired magazine.

Even a quick search of the uber-popular social networking site reveals a trove of sex-charged profiles.

"I'm a full Gfe [girlfriend experience] provider. For a list of my services go to my Website," writes 'Molly Ravish' on her page, which features a picture of a young blond woman in lingerie.

Ravish's personal Web page offers titillating photos and a detailed description of her services: 200 dollars for an hour of passion, including "deep French kissing" and oral sex - and 150 dollars for 30 minutes.

"Succulent, sweet, and dripping with charm, I beleive [sic] you will find me to be seductive, sensuous, and enticing," her website states.

Other pages owned by local sex workers are less risque - but just as easy to find.

Venkatesh says Facebook allows hookers to "control their image, set their prices, and sidestep some of the pimps, madams, and other intermediaries who once took a share of the revenue".

In 2008, Facebook accounted for 25 per cent of the regular clients served by the women Venkatesh followed.

Top NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said the findings aren't too surprising.

"Everybody is using the Internet," he said.

Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes said the site comes down hard on anyone who uses it for illegal ends.

Download the final Firefox 4 beta

The final Firefox 4 beta is now ready to download and test.

Mozilla has released final beta release, which features faster graphics rendering as well as start-up and page load times. Firefox also supports WebM format to enable HD-quality video, WebGL for 3D graphics, and multi-touch support for Microsoft's Windows 7.

In an announcement on the Mozilla blog, the company says the latest beta includes more than 7,000 bug fixes compared to the first beta release.

"We couldn't build Firefox 4 beta without the help of our millions of beta testers and their feedback, which we welcome as we work to deliver an awesome experience to the more than 400 million Firefox users worldwide," said Mozilla.

Mozilla's release manager, Christian Legnitto, confirmed that Firefox 4 beta 12 is the "last planned beta".

"It may be confusing that nightly builds after beta 12 identify themselves as version 2.0b13pre. The versioning is merely a product of automation. This does not mean we are having a beta 13," he said.

Mozilla is also working with the developer community to make sure Firefox add-ons are compatible with the features, look and functionality of the latest beta.

Download Firefox 4 beta here.

Facebook Tries to Simplify Privacy Policy

n an effort to take some of the legalese out of a legal document, Facebook Inc. unveiled a new draft of its closely watched privacy policy.
[0225facebook2J] Associated Press

The new policy doesn't change the social network's data-handling practices, said Edward Palmieri, a privacy and product counsel at Facebook. Rather, the goal was to "apply the Facebook design experience that we bring to everything we do and extend that to our privacy policy."

In place of an existing document that Facebook admitted was "longer than the U.S. constitution – without the amendments," the draft policy contains chunks of information organized around more practical headings such as "Your information and how it is used" and "how advertising works."

"We struggle with really hitting home to users that we do not sell their data to advertisers," said Mr. Palmieri, so the new policy includes screen shots that show what advertisers see about Facebook users.

Privacy policies are often written by lawyers in notoriously vague language to provide companies legal cover for required notice about user data that's required by the Federal Trade Commission and other regulatory bodies. But in a recent report, the FTC noted that it was difficult for the average person to understand privacy policies – and that many people assume that just because a company has one, their privacy is being protected.

Efforts to simplify privacy policies and controls have gained steam across a range of companies, including Google Inc., which began offering a new privacy dashboard last fall that helps users learn what the company knows about them.

Facebook said it has been working on the new privacy policy since a corporate "Hackathon" last October, and consulted with a handful of privacy groups for feedback. "The new policy is much more of a user guide to how to manage your data," said Jules Polonetsky, the director of the Future of Privacy Forum, which was consulted by Facebook. "You might actually want to read this thing."

Some privacy advocates, though, were critical of rough edges in Facebook's policies. "It is very good for companies to actually be making privacy policies easier to understand -- but users should be looking for privacy policies that are not only readable, but actually protect their privacy," said Nicole Ozer, a policy director at the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California.

In particular, she said she had questions about what appeared to be a shift in language by Facebook about what it considers personal information. The draft new policy uses the term "your information," which it defines as "the information that's required when you sign up for the site, as well as the information you intentionally share."

Ms. Ozer said she was worried that definition didn't include user data such as the location of a mobile phone, IP addresses and the date that photos were taken. A Facebook spokesman said the company's intention was to treat these kinds of information exactly as they are in the current privacy policy, but it would take a look again after receiving feedback.

The new privacy policy is just the latest step by Facebook to address user and regulators' concern about privacy. Amidst a torrent of criticism about its privacy controls last spring, Facebook consolidated many of its settings into control panel designed to make it easier for users to adjust when and how their information was shared with other users and third parties.

In February 2009, user concern about changes that the company introduced to its terms of service gave rise to a new system whereby the users of the social network get to vote and comment on its governing document.

Motorola Xoom: 8 Things To Like

I've now had the chance to spend some time with the Motorola Xoom, which is the first tablet to run Goolge's Android 3.0 Honeycomb operating system. Having used previous Android tablets, such as the original Samsung Galaxy Tab, it's clear that this is a huge step forward. There's a lot to like about the Xoom, but a number of concerns as well. But for this post, I'll focus on the things I liked about the Xoom, particularly in contrast to the iPad, which to date has been the dominant consumer tablet.


1. It's fast. A number of applications seemed very fast on the Xoom -- much faster than on other mobile devices I've tried, which is almost certainly due to the Tegra 2 dual-core processor. In particular, games like Dungeon Defender looked quite good, and I'm sure we'll see other higher-end games at this space. It's pretty amazing when you consider how small these devices are.

2. It multitasks very well. Applications can run in the background quite well; and you can see thumbnails or move to them quickly by pressing a window button that appears on the bottom of the screen. There seems to be a limit of five previews, but that's probably enough for most people. What's most impressive to me is that switching among the open windows is very fast.

3. Tabbed browsing is a big plus. It may be because I'm used to it on PCs, but being able to just open another tab and switch among them nearly instantly is really nice. I find it much faster than switching to a multiple-screen view on the iPad, for instance. And many people will like the ability to add an "incognito tab" for private browsing to sync their bookmarks with Google Chrome, or to see their downloads on a separate page.

4. Widgets are very handy. All the major Android devices I've seen have multiple "home screens" where you can arrange the icons for the applications you want, and add "widgets," which are like little snippets of applications. It's somewhat like the Windows or Mac desktops in that regard. Being able to put a small view of your calendar, mail items, news feeds, etc., make this quite useful. I wish Motorola included a few more options out of the box, such as a good weather widget, but it's still a great feature.

5. It has cameras. My guess is people will actually use the front-facing 2-megapixel camera -- particularly with video chat applications such as Google Talk -- and I would expect use to increase when more video-calling applications designed for the tablet come out (such as a video version of Skype). I can't imagine that will take long. There is also a 5-megapixel camera on the back with a flash, but it's hard to imagine wanting to use such a big device as a camera when most phones have as good of a camera as an option.

6. The screen is better for HD video. With a resolution of 1280 by 800, the Xoom's screen shape is well suited for 720p video, and it worked well with the included YouTube application. I don't have any magazine or newspaper applications really written for the tablet yet, but I wonder whether it will be as good for that. But still, for video, this is an improvement, and including a mini-HDMI out so you can transfer video and audio to an HDTV is a great option.

7. Multimedia looks very good. While Google's multimedia offerings don't stack up to the iTunes store (Google has a decent selection of books, but doesn't yet offer movies or music), you can use third party stores such as Amazon to get content on the device, and you can connect the Xoom to your PC to download content as well. The music application does a good job of showing album covers and letting you create playlists on the devices, and it comes with Movie Studio, a nice if basic video editing program. The fact that you can do that at all on a tablet is pretty amazing to me.

8. Android is more flexible. Over time, and not much time either, we should see lots more Android Honeycomb-based tablets from all sorts of vendors, and that should mean a lot of choices. I expect to see tablets with different screen sizes, processors, cameras (LG even has a 3D camera), and software customization. That's something Apple won't do -- for better or worse. It makes it harder for developers, but gives customers more choices. And Motorola and Google have promised Flash support, something Apple is avoiding.

So that's what I liked. In the next post, I'll talk about the 8 things I disliked.

Game fans snap up Nintendo's 3DS at Japan launch

TOKYO (Reuters) - Game fans hit Japanese stores early on Saturday to be among the first to get their hands on Nintendo's new 3D-capable game player, but the gadget's sales may be squeezed in the longer term by competition from smartphones and tablets.

CBI arrests NALCO chairman in bribery case

NALCO is the country's third-largest producer of aluminium. The Congress-led ruling coalition is under criticism over several graft scandals, including a $39 billion telecom licence scam.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh gave in on Tuesday to opposition demands for a parliamentary probe into the multi-billion dollar scandal over sales of telecoms licenses for kickbacks, a setback for his embattled government and a victory for the opposition.

The CBI said in a statement issued late on Friday that NALCO's chairman and managing director, A.K. Srivastava, had accepted a bribe of 3 kg gold through his wife, who was also arrested.

NALCO confirmed the arrest but declined to comment further, and the chairman's lawyer was not immediately available for comment.

The CBI said it has recovered another 7 kg gold and about 3 million rupees in cash from the couple.

(Reporting by Rajesh Kumar Singh; editing by Yoko Nishikawa)

Madonna is a fantastic mother: Kelly Osbourne

Singer Kelly Osbourne, who is the new face of Madonna and her daughter Lourdes’ fashion line – Material Girl, seems to be in awe of her, as she thinks Madonna is a “fantastic mother”.

Osbourne, 26, met the mother-of-four after becoming the model for her and 14-year-old daughter’s fashion range.

“It completely changed my opinion of her and made me like her even more once I met Lola (Lourdes) because she’s done a fantastic job with her,” dailystar.co.uk quoted Osbourne as saying.

Babies, toddlers too can suffer mental illness

Infants and toddlers too can suffer serious mental disorders, yet they are not likely to receive treatment that could prevent lasting damage, says a new study.

“The pervasive, but mistaken, impression that young children do not develop mental health problems” keeps them away from treatment, say study authors Joy D. Osofsky and Alicia F. Lieberman from the Universities of Louisiana State and California respectively.

They are supposed to be “immune to the effects of early adversity and trauma because they are inherently resilient and ‘grow out of’ behavioural problems and emotional difficulties,” add Osofsky and Lieberman, reports the journal American Psychologist.

Their study, part of the series examining the lack of mental healthcare for children from birth to five years, jointly edited by Ed Tronick, University of Massachusetts, and Osofsky, explores how infants develop mental health problems and recommend improvements, according to a University of California statement.

Even young infants can react to the meaning of others’ intentions and emotions because they have their own rudimentary intentions and motivating emotions, according to an article by Tronick and Marjorie Beeghly, of Wayne State University.

“Infants make meaning about themselves and their relation to the world of people and things,” Tronick and Beeghly stated, and when that “meaning-making” goes wrong, it can lead to development of mental health problems.

“Some infants may come to make meaning of themselves as helpless and hopeless, and they may become apathetic, depressed and withdrawn,” they write.

High cholesterol, BP in mid-age tied to memory problems

Middle-aged men and women having high cholesterol and high blood pressure may not only be at risk for heart disease, but possibly develop early cognitive and memory problems as well.

For the study, 3,486 men and 1,341 women with an average age of 55 underwent cognitive tests three times over 10 years. The tests measured reasoning, memory, fluency and vocabulary.

Participants received a Framingham risk score that is used to predict 10-year risk of a cardiovascular event.

It is based on age, sex, HDL cholesterol, total cholesterol, blood pressure and whether they smoked or had diabetes, according to the statement of the French National Institute of Health & Medical Research, Paris.

The study found that people who had higher cardiovascular risk were more likely to have lower cognitive function and a faster rate of overall cognitive decline compared to those with the lowest risk of heart disease.

A 10-percent higher cardiovascular risk was associated with poorer cognitive test scores in all areas except reasoning for men and fluency for women.

For example, a 10 percent higher cardiovascular risk was associated with a 2.8 percent lower score in the test of memory for men and a 7.1 percent lower score in the memory test for women.

“Our findings contribute to the mounting evidence for the role of cardiovascular risk factors, such as high cholesterol and blood pressure, contributing to cognitive problems, starting in middle age,” said study author Sara Kaffashian, with INSERM, the French National Institute of Health & Medical Research in Paris.

The findings will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology’s 63rd Annual Meeting in Honolulu April 9-16.

One-third HIV cases in age group 15-24: UNICEF report

Of the over 33 million HIV-AIDS cases reported worldwide every year, around one-third are adolescents of the age group 15-24 years, revealed a report by United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

The State of the World’s Children (SOWC) report 2011 was released by UNICEF in the capital Friday.

According to UNICEF’s annual flagship report on the adolescents (10-19 years) in the world, the risk of HIV infection is considerably higher among adolescent females and young women than their male counterparts of the same age group.

“There is lack of comprehensive and correct knowledge related to HIV. In developing countries, the problem is even more serious,” said Karin Hulshof, representative of UNICEF India.

According to the UNAIDS, there are about 7,400 new infections diagnosed every day, with about 40 percent of those being in the 15-24 age group.

Only 30 percent males and 19 percent females have correct knowledge about the disease, the report said.

The report recommendations called for greater involvement and investment by the government as India shared nearly 20 percent of the adolescent population in the world.

“India is home to more than 243 million adolescents of the total 1.2 billion adolescents across the globe. We have to consider that this strata is the future of the country, especially when we call India a young nation,” said Naveen Jindal, MP and convenor of parliamentary forum on children.

The ministry of women and child development (MWCD) also announced the success of its pilot programme SABLA — Rajiv Gandhi Scheme for Empowerment of Adolescent Girls — aimed at addressing the problems of adolescent girls between 11 and 18 years.

The central government had doled out nearly Rs.1,000 crore for the central scheme that is being implemented through Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) projects and anganwadi centres.

“We plan to reach out over one crore girls in 200 identified districts after a baseline survey was conducted. Ministry will consider more such models if SABLA is successful,” said D.K. Sikri, secretary, MWCD.

The report also said that with 81 million young people out of work globally in 2009, youth unemployment remains a concern in almost every country.

“In the year 2008, youth were nearly three times more likely to be unemployed in India,” said a UNICEF official who was a part of the study.

More than seventy million adolescents of lower secondary age are currently out of school, and on a global level girls still lag behind boys in secondary school participation, the report mentioned.

Will Kashmir rail line by ready by 2017?

The Indian Railways’ plan to cut through the mountains in Jammu and Kashmir, construct bridges and bore tunnels and get the train chugging into the Kashmir Valley in 2017 is a deadline on which doubts have been cast by many, the latest being Chief Minister Omar Abdullah.

Chief Minister Omar Abdullah in his tweet posted: “Rail line (from Udhampur to Srinagar) date is given in 2017. Banihal-Qazigund day break this year December & line opening in 2013. Now let’s wait & see.”

The Banihal-Qazigund line was to be ready by December 2011, but now the deadline has been postponed to 2013.

His predecessor Mufti Mohammad Sayeed was excited when the Udhampur-Srinagar project was declared as a “national project” and the railways committed that it would be completed by August 2007. But four years have passed since the last deadline and there is no sign of the rail reaching the valley anytime soon.

The work so far has been sluggish because of the low allocation of funds – the next financial year’s allocation is Rs.1,100 crore. By the current price index, the project cost is over Rs.19,000 crore and only Rs.6,000 crore have been spent so far. The second reason is the militancy and the ever-recurring summer unrest in the valley.

Kashmiri protesters had torched the railway stations and uprooted the tracks last year, and before that militants had bombed the rail tracks. The uncertain situation continues to affect the progress of the work, according to sources in the railways here.

Sehwag hit on the ribs, will be fit for England tie

Destructive opener Virender Sehwag was hit on the left ribcage while batting in the nets Friday, but will be fit to play against England in India’s second World Cup game here Sunday.

“Virender Sehwag was hit on the left ribcage in the nets earlier today. He is currently under medication. However, he is expected to be fit for the match against England on Sunday,” BCCI secretary N. Srinivasan said in a statement.

Sehwag struck a smashing 175 in the team’s torunament opener against Bangladesh.

Pakistan elect to bat against Sri Lanka

Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi won the toss and elected to bat against Sri Lanka in the World Cup Group A match at R. Premadasa Stadium here Saturday.

Teams:
Pakistan:
Shahid Afridi (captain), Mohammad Hafeez, Ahmed Shehzad, Kamran Akmal (wicket-keeper), Younis Khan, Misbah-ul-Haq, Umar Akmal, Abdul Razzaq, Umar Gul, Abdur Rehman,
Shoaib Akhtar.

Sri Lanka:
Kumar Sangakkara (captain and wicket-keeper), Upul Tharanga, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Mahela Jayawardene, Thilan Samaraweera, Chamara Silva, Angelo Mathews, Thisara Perera, Nuwan Kulasekara, Rangana Herath, Muttiah Muralitharan.

Google planning ‘radical’ new Chrome browser

Software developers working on Google’s popular Chrome browser are testing “radical” changes to its appearance.

Sources close to the company said the address bar currently takes up a significant amount of space that could be used for web browsing. One plan being considered would mean it was only visible when users made their mouse pointer hover over a specific part of the screen, the Telegraph reports.

The new “compact” navigation mode, described on the Chromium website as one of two key focuses for development, would take the web address bar out of each tab, releasing more screen space to display web pages.

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9, which is available in a nearly final pre-release version, adopts a similar approach already. Chrome, however, is thought to be planning a significantly more stripped down version, working towards releasing almost the entire screen for web browsing.

More than 120 million users now use Google Chrome, which has been heavily advertised by Google. The company is also working on a ‘Chrome OS’ rival to Microsoft Windows.

Google updates Chrome every six weeks, but major upgrades tend to be far less frequent.

Apple to unveil new iPad

Tech giant Apple is set to unveil a new version of its hugely successful iPad in March. The iPad 2 will be thinner than its predecessor and feature an improved display.

Analysts expect the new version will have a front-facing camera and Facetime video chat support, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

It will be powered by one of Qualcomm’s multimode chips and will run on both GSM and CDMA-based networks around the world.

Apple said it had sold nearly 15 million iPads, since it went on sale last spring.

This is a very big deal, although Apple will be facing increased competition with the launch of a passel of tablets coming from numerous manufacturers, most of which are using the Honeycomb version of Google’s Android mobile operating system, the Journal said.

The launch will take place March 2 in San Francisco, the scene of many such Apple events, it said citing sources.

Mamata’s rail budget promises growth with human face

With highest ever allocation of Rs.57,630 crore ($13 billion), Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee Friday presented the rail budget for 2011-12, promising to move fast to build a stronger railroad infrastructure while addressing the needs of the average person.

From more money for better safety and several industrial parks under the public-private partnership model to new coach factories and rail-based industries, the budget sought to address all constituencies – the needs of the corporate sector as well as average passengers.

“We have taken a two-pronged approach. On the one hand, building sustainable, efficient, rapidly-growing railways. On the other, having an acute sense of social responsibility towards the common people,” Banerjee told the Lok Sabha.

“In this budget we have attempted to combine a strong economic focus with an equivalent emphasis on social inclusion with a human face,” she said in her opening remarks of what was her fifth such exercise as railways minister.

The latest rail budget also comes against the backdrop of the assembly elections due soon in the home state of the minister, whose Trinamool Congress has set its eyes on forming the next government.

Opposition members, especially those from the Rashtriya Janata Dal, Samajwadi Party and the Bharatiya Janata Party, were up on their feet, protesting what they said was undue attention to West Bengal in the annual rail budget.

But Banerjee was equally fiery. “I am proud of my state. I’ll do whatever possible for West Bengal along with what I’ll do for other states of my country.” This led to some disruptions, forcing the minister to stop her speech on several occassions.

In the previous two rail budgets for the United Progressive Alliance government, Banerjee had announced 122 new trains in 2009-10 and another 54 a year later, without altering the freight or passenger tariff rates.

Indian Railways, the world’s second largest under a single management, has a network of 64,099 route km to ferry as many as 18.9 million passengers on 7,000 trains daily from 6,906 stations. It also runs 4,000 freight trains to carry 850 million tonnes of cargo.

Following are the highlights of the budget:

* Safety first priority; accident rate has come down.

* Decision to start pilot projects to give shelter to homeless people.

* Outlay of 57,630 crore for 2011-12, the highest investment in one year.

* Rs.10,000 crore to be raised through railway bonds.

* Pradhan Mantri Rail Vikas Yojna to be launched.

* Industrial park to be set up in Nandigram, West Bengal.

* Fund to be created for socially desirable projects.

* First coach from Rae Bareli factory in next three months.

* Work on wagon factory in Orissa to begin after land is acquired.

* Railways to set up factory in Jammu and Kashmir.

* To set up Metro coach factory at Singur, West Bengal.

* Manipur to be soon connected to railway network.

* Centre for excellence in software to be set up at Darjeeling.

* Combines strong economic focus along with inclusion.

* Develop business-oriented policies to aid industry.

* Happy to announce 85 PPP proposals received; set up single-window system to take these forward.

* Decide to set-up rail-based industries.

* Upgraded class of air conditioned travel to be introduced shortly.

* Anti-collision device, successful in North West Frontier Railway, to be extended to three more zonal railways.

* Will add 180 km of rail lines in 2011-12.

* All-India security helpline set up.

* To adopt modern technology through centres of academic excellence.

* Work started on two dedicated freight corridors.

* Work on upgrading 442 stations to be completed by March 31.

* First coach from Rae Bareli factory in next three months.

Sensex slips under rate hike fears, Middle East tensions

It was a bad week for Indian equities markets with investors choosing to offload stocks as another round of monetary tightening by the country’s central bank loomed and oil prices rose as tensions in the Middle East and Libya continued.

The 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) ended the week at 17,700.91 points, down 2.8 percent or 510.61 points from the previous week’s close of 18,211.52 points.

The 50-scrip S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange ended the week at 5,303.55 points, down 155.4 points or 2.84 percent from the previous week close of 5,458.95 points.

Broader markets saw more losses, with the BSE midcap index falling 4.63 percent and the BSE smallcap index slipping 4.18 percent.

According to data available with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), foreign institutional investors sold stocks worth $432.79 million during the week.

Food inflation moved up to 11.49 percent for the week ended Feb 12 as compared with 11.05 percent in the previous week. The barometer for measuring food prices has remained in high double-digit for most part of current fiscal.

The annual inflation based on wholesale prices stood at 8.23 percent in January. Even the annual review of the economy – the Economic Survey – released Friday cautioned against high inflation and advocated hiking interest rates by the Reserve Bank of India.

The recent spike in crude oil price has further complicated the situation for the economic policy makers in India. Crude oil price surged to $112 a barrel (159 litres) Friday on concerns that political unrest in the Middle East will create supply shortages.

On a weekly basis, there were only three gainers on the 30-scrip Sensex: Hindustan Unilever, up 1.7 percent at Rs.279.50; Reliance Industries, up 1.1 percent at Rs.965.95; and TCS, up 0.2 percent at Rs.1,111.20.

Losers on the benchmark index included Reliance Communications, down 13.2 percent at Rs.87.55; Tata Motors, down 11.6 percent at Rs.1,105.10; Jaiprakash Associates, down 11.4 percent at Rs.79.80; and M&M, down 11.4 percent at Rs.595.10.

Global markets too were not spared as the political turmoil in Libya and prospects of agitation spreading to more countries in the Arab world sent traders on a selling spree.

Economists warned that if oil prices rise above $120 a barrel and continued to hover around that level for some time, the economic recovery seen in many countries after the global meltdown could get derailed.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng shed 2.47 percent lower during the week to end at 23,012.37 points, while a benchmark of Chinese markets, Shanghai Composite index, moved 0.73 percent lower to close at 2,878.57 points.

The Japanese Nikkei ended 2.91 percent lower at 10,526.76 points compared to last Friday’s close.

Among the European markets, the UK’s FTSE 100 advanced ended 1.34 percent down at 6,001.20, the French CAC 40 fell 2.09 percent at 4,070.38 points and its the German peer ended the week 3.25 percent lower.