The World Tourism Day is being celebrated on Sunday amid the coronavirus pandemic with the theme “Tourism and Rural Development”. One of India’s prime tourist attractions, Rajasthan is pondering ways to reinvigorate the activity in the sector.
The Rajasthan government’s new tourism policy complements the theme keeping rural tourism in focus.
The Rajasthan government’s new tourism policy provides for innovative tourism products and services with the focus on lesser known destinations especially in the rural areas, confirmed tourism officials.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has also directed the promotion of tourism in villages as a means to improve the rural economy, they said.
“Across the world, COVID-19 has impacted the livelihoods of millions of people related to travel and tourism. Rajasthan government is effectively working to mitigate its effect in the state. The new tourism policy and other initiatives by the government are offering support to the industry. As the situation eases and India passes through unlock phases, the facilities for the visitors need to be revamped and aligned with the new normal,” said Alok Gupta, Principal Secretary Tourism, Rajasthan.
The tourism sector has been the worst-hit by the COVID-19 pandemic and is striving for revival and needs more infrastructure support. The Rajasthan Tourism Policy 2020 promotes new investments in developing new tourist venues with the focus on strengthening infrastructure and improving road, rail and air connectivity, the official said.
There was also an added emphasis on the safety and security of the tourists. The policy thus has been creating a conducive environment for enabling the tourism sector in the state. Promoting local craft and cuisine has also been made part of the policy, he added.
The state government has offered several relief measures for existing tourism businesses in view of Covid-19. The tourism department has also formulated strategies to ensure safe tourism by issuing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). The tourist destinations and monuments are being sanitized and there is added emphasis on social awareness and hygiene in the new policy.
The state government has already declared reimbursement of the state’s GST share to hotels and restaurants, the motor vehicle tax has been relaxed for vehicles of more than 22-person capacity and relaxations have been given in renewal of bar licences. In order to allow businesses to operate in a safe environment, the tourism department has issued SOPs for hotels, restaurants and film shoots in the state, officials confirmed to IANS.
The tourism department has also been working to promote skill development, strengthening of the Tourist Protection Force, promoting tourist start-ups and other experiential tourism initiatives.
Modi promised the world that India, the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer, would share its therapeutic solutions with the global community…reports Asian Lite News
Prime Minister Narendra Modi addresses on the occasion of Word Youth Skill Day via video conferencing from New Delhi on July 15, 2020. (Photo: IANS/PIB)
For the second time in a week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tore into the outdated structures of the United Nations, turning the mirror on the global body and urging it to fix its internal crisis so that it could reflect the world as it exists today rather than as it was in the 1940s.
“For how long will India be kept out of the decision making structures of the United Nations?” Modi questioned the UN.
“When we were strong, we were never a threat to the world, when we were weak, we were never a burden to the world”, he said.
Modi promised the world that India, the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer, would share its therapeutic solutions with the global community.
“India is proud of the fact that it is one of the founding members of the United Nations. On this historic occasion, I have come to this global platform to share the sentiments of 1.3 billion people of India,” he said.
“The world of 1945 was significantly different from today’s world. The global situation, sources, resources, problems, solutions. All were quite different. And as a result, the form and the composition of the United Nations was established with the aim of global welfare, but in accordance with the prevailing situation of those times.”
“Today, we are in a completely different era. In the 21st century, the requirements and challenges of our present as well as our future are vastly different from those of the past.”
“Therefore, the international community today is faced with a very important question whether the character of the institution constituted in the prevailing circumstances of 1945 is relevant, even today, with the changing times,” Modi said.
United Nations: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan addresses at the 74th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), at United Nations on Sep 27, 2019. (Photo: IANS)
In a tweet, India’s Permanent Representative to the UN, T.S. Tirumurti decried Khan’s attacks as “warmongering and obfuscation”…reports Arul Louis
United Nations: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan addresses at the 74th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), at United Nations on Sep 27, 2019. (Photo: IANS)
The Indian delegate at the United Nations General Assembly session on Friday walked out in protest when Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan began attacking India in his speech at the high-level meeting.
First Secretary Mijito Vinito, who was sitting on the second seat in the first row of the Assembly chamber, stood up and left as soon as Khan turned on India by focusing on the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
In a tweet, India’s Permanent Representative to the UN, T.S. Tirumurti decried Khan’s attacks as “warmongering and obfuscation”.
Khan’s pre-recorded speech was screened at the General Assembly chamber during the annual meeting stymied this year by the Covid-19 precautions.
A new element tucked into Khan’s 34-minute speech, more than a third of which was devoted to India, was a call for the Security Council to send its peacekeeping force to Kashmir by drawing a parallel to East Timor, now known as Timor-Leste.
“The Security Council must prevent a disaster conflict (in Kashmir) and secure the implementation of its own resolutions, as it did in the case of East Timor,” Khan said.
Mijito Vinito, a first secretary in India’s United Nations Mission replies to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan’s attacks on India in his speech at the High-Level session of the UN General Assembly on Friday, September 25, 2020. (Photo: UN/IANS)
The Security Council authorised international intervention and sent peacekeepers in the aftermath of the Indonesian invasion of the former Portuguese colony, but a parallel would require such a force to clear Pakistanis in Kashmir in defiance of its resolution demanding their withdrawal.
Khan also declared a thinly veiled support for the attacks on India by the militants.
“The government and the people of Pakistan are committed to standing by and supporting the Kashmiri brothers and sisters in their legitimate struggle for self-determination,” he said.
To preemptively deny the involvement in any Pakistan-sponsored attacks on India, Khan said, “We have consistently sensitised the world community about a false flag operation.”
Khan alleged, “India is playing a dangerous game of upping the ante against Pakistan in a nuclearised environment.”
In his tweet, Tirumurti said, “PM of Pakistan’s statement a new diplomatic low at 75th UN General Assembly. Another litany of vicious falsehood, personal attacks, warmongering and obfuscation of Pakistan’s persecution of its own minorities and of its cross-border terrorism. Befitting Right of Reply awaits.”
At the start of his speech with religious platitudes, Khan declared his commitment to an even more stringent theocratic state before accusing India of moving away from secularism.
“We envisage Naya Pakistan to be modelled on the principles of the state of Medina, established by the Holy Prophet Mohammed,” he declared.
Later, the premier of the Islamic republic, which constitutionally denies full citizenship rights to non-Muslims as well as Muslims of the Ahmadiyya sect, asserted that India is giving up on the secularism of Mahatma Gandhi and is moving towards a “Hindutva” state.
“The secularism of Gandhi and Nehru has been replaced by the dream of creating a Hindu Rashtra,” he asserted.
Khan’s attacks on the RSS is to try to build up support for his cause, which has so far seen only Turkish support, by linking it to Nazism as his attacks on India have not found any backing.
Khan was silent on the persecution of the Uighur minority in China, Pakistan’s patron, and Beijing’s verified creation of camps for internment of the Muslim minority and campaign to eradicate their cultural and religious identity.
But he claimed that according to “reports”, there were camps in India filled with Muslims.
He also accused India of changing the demography of Kashmir and suppressing its cultural identity.
He invoked the Security Council resolutions on Kashmir and said the Council should enforce them.
However, the main resolution on Kashmir — No. 47 — demands that Pakistan should withdraw its troops and personnel from Kashmir.
The man who had sung the one of the popular duets with P. Susheela “Aayiaram Nilevae Vaa” (Come thousand moons) for M.G. Ramachandran (MGR) in the Tamil movie Adimai Penn has finally reached the stars, perhaps to sing for the Gods…writes VENKATACHARI JAGANNATHAN
SP Balasubrahmanyam.
S.P. Balasubrahmanyam or popularly SPB, the playback singer, as well the voice over, of popular heroes of Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada and Hindi movies has gone silent permanently on Friday.
The coronavirus attacked his lungs and permanently silenced the singer who had sung over 40,000 songs in 16 languages over a career spanning five decades.
On August 5, in a Facebook post, the 74-year old SPB said that he was suffering from a very mild attack of coronavirus and had got himself hospitalised to take rest.
He had said that though the doctors had advised him to stay at home and take rest, he decided to be in a hospital, as at home his family members would get concerned.
He hoped to get discharged from the hospital in two days. But it was not to be.
The man who had sung the one of the popular duets with P. Susheela “Aayiaram Nilevae Vaa” (Come thousand moons) for M.G. Ramachandran (MGR) in the Tamil movie Adimai Penn has finally reached the stars, perhaps to sing for the Gods.
Curiously, during his over five decades of playback singing career, SPB has sung several moon songs.
He is survived by wife Savitri, a son S.P. Charan – a movie producer and playback singer, and daughter Pallavi.
Honoured with Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan awards in 2001 and 2011 respectively, SPB has won six National Film Awards for the best male playback singer and several other state awards.
Born to S.P. Sambamurthy, a Harikatha artist and mother Sakunthalamma on June 4, 1946, SPB got interested in music at a young age. His younger sister P. Sailaja was also a movie playback singer.
While pursuing his engineering course, he used to participate in singing competitions and won prizes.
“At one such competition, popular playback singer S. Janaki while giving the prize sowed the seed of singing in movies in me by saying that I can shine in the cine world. She encouraged me saying that she too was not a trained singer,” SPB had reminisced at a media meet.
Later he started visiting music directors seeking an opportunity to become a movie playback singer.
A humble person, SPB had said that if a person achieves something significant in a field, then it is due to the nudges and help rendered by several others. And in his case, there were couple of people.
He had said that but for his friend and roommate Murali who had compelled him to reach the recording studio in 1966 December, he wouldn’t have become a movie singer.
SPB recorded his first song composed by music director and his mentor S.P.Kodandapani for the Telugu movie Sri Sri Sri Maryada Ramanna.
Nearly a week later after his debut, he recorded his first Kannada song for the movie Nakkare Ade Swarga in 1967.
Soon he became busy with Telugu movie songs.
Looking back, SPB in an interview said that his evolution as a playback singer was largely due to Telugu music director Sathyam.
It was the Telugu movie Sankarabharanam that made the nation turn towards SPB. The movie directed by K. Viswanath and the music scored by K.V.Mahadevan turned out to be a big hit.
SPB got his first National Film Award for Best Male Playback singer.
Though his first Tamil movie song was “Athaanodu Ippadi Irundhu Eththanai Naalaachu” along with L.R.Eswari and music scored by another legend M.S.Viswanathan (MSV), the song and the movie aHotel Ramba’ did not come out.
As the movie was stopped midway, no music company had bought the rights and made the gramophone recording.
Later SPB sang for actor Gemini Ganesan (Iyarkai Ennum Ilaya Kanni), for MGR (Aayiram Nilavae Vaa) and went on to the Malayalam movie industry.
At a media meet SPB had said he was grateful to MGR for postponing the shooting for “Aayiram Nilavae Vaa” by a month so that the song was ready.
The singer said he was then down with fever. Given his stature MGR could have recorded the song with a different singer and gone ahead with the shooting.
“I had asked MGR about that later. He said after the audition, I would have told my friends that I will be singing for MGR. And if I was replaced the talk would be that MGR didn’t like my voice and so he chose some other singer. That would have been a big setback for my Tamil movie career, which he (MGR) didn’t want to happen,” SPB recalled the incident.
After that there was no looking back for him. In the Tamil movie world, he had sung for MGR, Sivaji Ganesan, Gemini Ganesan, Kamal Haasan, Rajinikanth and others.
At one point he was so prolific that he recorded over 15 songs in a day.
The mid 1970s saw the entry of music director Illaiyaraaja who later became a major force in the Tamil movie industry. The two — SPB and Ilaiyaraaja — had known each other even before the latter became a music director.
The 1980s saw the trio – Illaiyaraaja, SPB and S. Janaki- recording a large number of songs and most of them became great hits.
It is a different matter that Illaiyaraaja and SPB had some difference of opinion on the royalty issue. As per law Illaiyaraaja had demanded that SPB pay him royalty for singing his songs on stage performances. The two patched up soon.
It was in 1981that SPB made his debut in the Hindi movie world singing for Kamal Haasan in “Ek Duuje Ke Liye” and went on to sing in movies like “Maine Pyar Kiya”, “Hum Aapke Hain Kaun” and others.
“It was K.Balachander, Director, Ek Duuje Ke Liye who had insisted that I should sing for Kamal Haasan though the music composers Laxmikant-Pyarelal were bit reluctant to try me out,” SPB reminisced.
It is a different matter SPB got National Award for one of the songs in that movie.
During 1990s the list of music directors he worked with increased like Deva, S.A.Rajkumar, Vidyasagar and A.R.Rahman in the hit movie Roja.
Apart from singing, SPB has also dubbed for several leading artists in Tamil and Telugu movies. For Kamal Haasan he was the default voice in Telugu movies. He had dubbed for Ben Kingsley in the Telugu dubbing of English movie Gandhi.
As an actor too, SPB made a mark in jovial father character.
Male: Prime Minister Narendra Modi felicitates Ibrahim Mohamed Solih on his assumption of office as the 7th President of Maldives in Male, Maldives on Nov 17, 2018. (Photo: IANS/MEA)
The archipelago nation on the Indian Ocean owes about $1.4 billion to China. It is a huge sum for a country which has a GDP of $5.7 billion, this translates to almost one-fourth…reports MAHUA VENKATESH
Prime Minister Narendra Modi felicitates Ibrahim Mohamed Solih on his assumption of office as the 7th President of Maldives in Male. (Photo: IANS/MEA)
As tourism-the most important sector for Maldives, contributing the most of the nations gross domestic product-took a huge blow with the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, concerns over debt repayment to ‘ally China are looming large.
The archipelago nation on the Indian Ocean owes about $1.4 billion to China. It is a huge sum for a country which has a GDP of $5.7 billion, this translates to almost one-fourth. What is worrisome is that, as many analysts said, the figure of $1.4 billion may not be a true representation, the actual debt feared to be much higher.
With the pandemic hitting the economy hard, amid the World Bank’s projection of an 8.5 per cent contraction in its economy, the nation is in no position to make the repayment. Besides tourism, the country’s construction activities have also come to a near halt.
“The shock to tourism adversely affects employment and household earnings, as one-third of adult males and a quarter of females are engaged in tourism-related jobs. Lower-income households that depend on fisheries are also affected as exports of raw fish have ceased due to weak demand,” a World Bank report said.
Tourism accounts for about 28 per cent of the country’s GDP and generates over 60 per cent foreign exchange receipts.
In 2018, the Maldives government had indicated that interest rates extended on concessional loans from the dragon nation constitutes only about 1.5 per cent to 2 per cent, “while those on loans made under sovereign guarantee are around 6 per cent to 7 per cent”. The Nikkei Asian Review had quoted Maldivian Finance Minister Ibrahim Ameer as saying, “We are mostly looking into increasing the repayment period.”
The Chinese debt trap
Maldives President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, soon after getting elected in 2018, said that the country’s close tie-ups with China has brought about a financial crisis into the nation.
“Solih appeared to be in no doubt that the country’s financial crisis was brought about by the previous administration’s overly-close relationship with China. The implication is that China, as it has done in Sri Lanka, has used financial loans to manipulate the Maldives into a position of indebtedness to Beijing,” Futuredirections.org.au said.
The Maldives-India Relationship: From Frying Pan to Fire?
Just after Maldives celebrated its 55th Independence Day on July 26, China issued a notice asking Male to repay $10 million which was backed by sovereign guarantee. This means that failure to repay would amount to a sovereign default that has serious ramifications for the country’s economy. Reports have suggested that the Xi Jinping government in August sought repayment of a larger amount, paid.
In 2017, China gave a $127 million loan to Sun Siyam Resorts Private Ltd but what is interesting is that the Maldivian government had extended sovereign guarantee for the same.
“At $1.4 billion, of which $857 million has been disbursed, most of the foreign debt is owed to China for financing former President Abdulla Yameen’s infrastructure scale-up,” Maldives Independent reported said.
According to Harvard Business Review, China with its debt diplomacy, currently is a major global lender, with outstanding claims now exceeding more than 5 per cent of global GDP. The lending is done both directly by the government and the state-controlled entities.
India and Maldives
Relations between India and Maldives ran into troubled waters under former Maldivian president Abdulla Yameen, who conceded defeat in the 2018 elections.
Thereafter, however, India-Maldives ties have started improving with Prime Minister Narendra Modi attending Solih’s swearing in ceremony. Importantly, Maldives stood by India at the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC) virtual meet at a time when New Delhi had come under attack in the wake of the abrogation of Article 370 and the passing of Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).
“Targeting a specific country will be like side-stepping the real issue. In this light, let me state that singling out India, the largest democracy in the world and a multicultural society and home to over 200 million Muslims, alleging Islamophobia would be factually incorrect,” Maldives’ Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Thilmeeza Hussain said in the meeting.
Earlier, Solih even thanked India for rescuing Maldivians stuck at Wuhan when the coronavirus pandemic had hit the region.
