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The Digital Communications Commission (DCC), the highest decision-making body of the Department of Telecommunications, on Friday accepted Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's (TRAI) recommendations on the base prices of 5G airwaves, according to a report in the Economic Times.

While deciding that the spectrum should be auctioned for a period of 20 years, the inter-ministerial panel also decided against alloting spectrum directly to corporate bodies for private 5G networks - as recommended by TRAI - suggesting instead that they join hands with licensed telcos, thereby accepting a key demand of operators. Telcos have been pushing for an auction of the spectrum but while Bharti Airtel has suggested it should be bundled with 5G spectrum, Reliance Jio wants it to go up for auction independently.

The TRAI proposal had come under fire from telcos, who said it would kill the business case for 5G spectrum as it would dent revenue from enterprises.

The Minister of Communications Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Thursday that the DoT is working to resolve industry concerns on 5G.

The auctions , which will pave the way for 5G services in the country, are likely to be held in early June and services are expected to be rolled out by August-September this year

Also Read:- 84 years at same company: Meet 100-year-old world record holder

A 100-year-old man from Brazil has earned a Guinness World Record for the longest career at the same company. Walter Orthmann has been working at a textile company for 84 years.

Orthmann was born in Brusque, a town with a large German population. As a teenager, he began working at Industrias Renaux S.A, which is now known as ReneauxView.

"Back in 1938, kids were expected to work to help support the family," Orthmann was quoted as saying by Guinness. "As the oldest son of five, my mother took me to find a job at the age of 14."

He started off as a shipping assistant and was soon promoted to a sales position. Eventually, he became a sales manager.

In his 50s, Orthmann began travelling across the country, discovering new places and fostering professional relationships that became friendly.

In his career spanning decades, Orthmann has witnessed many changes -- at home and abroad. That, he said, taught him that it was important to be adaptable.

Orthamann turned 100 on April 19 this year and his coworkers and family threw a big party to celebrate his life.

Reflecting on his long stint at the same place, Orthmann said when people do what they enjoy, they don't see the time go by.

His advice for young professionals is to work for good establishments, in areas where they feel motivated.

Orthmann said that he does not bother himself with too much planning or worrying about the future.

 "All I care about is that tomorrow will be another day in which I will wake up, get up, exercise and go to work; you need to get busy with the present, not the past or the future," he told Guinness. "Here and now is what counts. So, let’s go to work!"

It will take nearly 15 years for the Indian economy to make up for the losses it has incurred during the coronavirus pandemic, according to the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) report on currency and finance for FY22.

"Taking the actual growth rate of -6.6 percent for 2020-21, 8.9 percent for 2021-22 and assuming growth rate of 7.2 percent for 2022-23, and 7.5 percent beyond that, India is expected to overcome COVID-19 losses in 2034-35," the report, released on April 29, said.

The report, whose theme this year is 'Revive and Reconstruct' in the context of nurturing a durable post-pandemic recovery and raising trend growth in the medium-term, does not reflect the views of the central bank itself but of the contributors, who are part of the RBI's Department of Economic and Policy Research.

The assumption of a growth rate of 7.5 percent from next year onwards is rather optimistic. The International Monetary Fund's latest World Economic Outlook report pegged India's growth rate for FY24 at 6.9 percent. Even the RBI's own Monetary Policy Report, released on April 8, said structural models indicated GDP growth in FY24 might be 6.3 percent.

Several independent economists see GDP growth next year, and possibly beyond that, closer to 6 percent. This would mean the losses incurred during the pandemic would take longer to overcome.

In monetary terms, the output losses assumed by the central bank's staff in its estimates are Rs 19.1 lakh crore for FY21, Rs 17.1 lakh crore for FY22 and Rs 16.4 lakh crore for FY23.

India's real GDP in FY22 is estimated to be Rs 147.54 lakh crore.

"The dividends of reforms initiated to counter the pre-COVID slowdown along with additional measures and initiatives during the pandemic will help launch the economy on a sustainable high growth path. The behavioural and technological changes brought about by the pandemic may usher in a new normal which would not necessarily ape the pre-pandemic trends but would be built on a more efficient, equitable, clean, and green foundation," the report added.

In the foreword to the report, Governor Shaktikanta Das said it was not sufficient to just stabilise the economy and return it to its pre-first wave path. The task at hand, according to Das, was to create a "virtuous cycle of greater opportunity" for entrepreneurs, businesses, and the fiscal authority.

India has asked state-run energy companies to evaluate the possibility of buying European oil major BP's stake in sanctions-hit Russian firm Rosneft, two people familiar with the matter said.

BP has announced it is abandoning its 19.75% stake in Rosneft.

The oil ministry last week conveyed its intent to ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL), Indian Oil Corp., Bharat Petro Resources Ltd (BPRL), Hindustan Pertoleum's subsidiary Prize Petroleum Ltd, Oil India Ltd and GAIL (India) Ltd, the sources said.

Indian companies and the oil ministry did not respond to Reuters emails seeking comment.

While Western nations have imposed sanctions against Russia over the war in Ukraine, India has not explicitly condemned Moscow's actions there.

The world's third biggest oil importer and consumer, India imports about 85% of its 5 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil needs.

The call on Indian companies to explore buying the stake in Rosneft came after BP CEO Bernard Looney met Indian oil minister Hardeep Singh Puri in March.

BP declined to comment.

Oil ministry also asked OVL, the overseas investment arm of Oil and Natural Gas Corp, to consider buying a 30% stake held by Exxon Mobile Corp, in the Sakhalin 1 project in Russia's Far East. Exxon is the operator of the project.

OVL already holds a 20% stake in the project.

Exxon said on March 1 it would exit about $4 billion in assets and discontinue all its Russia operations, including Sakhalin 1.

OVL also holds 26% stake in Vankorneft, owner of the Venkor field in the West Siberian Basin.

Separately, a consortium of Oil India, IOC, and BPRL, the exploration arm of state refiner Bharat Petroleum Corp, holds a 23.9% stake in Vankorneft and a 29.9% stake in Taas-Yuryakh in east Siberia.

One of the sources said Indian companies hope to get stakes in Russian assets at discounted rates given the risk involved, dubbing the potential transactions "distress sales".

A second source said Indian companies needed to study the impact of sanctions on potential investments and yet to start a process of due diligence.

"The fear is that this investment could get stuck in Russia as sanctions might bar us from bringing equity oil and gas to India."

"Our effort has been to see how we can stabilise economic transactions, economic engagements with Russia in the current context ... There are of course constraints, there are sanctions by some countries, and we will have to kind of work through that," India's foreign ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi told a news conference.

Exxon said on Wednesday its Russian unit Exxon Neftegas Ltd has declared force majeure for its Sakhalin-1 operations due to sanctions on Russia that have made it increasingly difficult to ship crude to customers.

Also Read:- What will Elon Musk's ownership of Twitter mean for 'free speech' on the platform?

In a surprise capitulation, the board of Twitter has announced it will support a takeover bid by Elon Musk, the world’s richest person. But is it in the public interest?

Musk is offering US$54.20 a share. This values the company at US$44 billion (or A$61 billion) – making it one of the largest leveraged buyouts on record.

Morgan Stanley and other large financial institutions will lend him US$25.5 billion. Musk himself will put in around US$20 billion. This is about the size of a single bonus he is expected to receive from Tesla.

In a letter to the chair of Twitter, Musk claimed he would “unlock” Twitter’s “extraordinary potential” to be “the platform for free speech around the globe”.

But the idea that social media has the potential to represent an unbridled mode of public discourse is underpinned by an idealistic understanding that has surrounded social media technologies for some time.

In reality, Twitter being owned by one person, some of whose own tweets have been false, sexist, market-moving and arguably defamatory poses a risk to the platform’s future.

Can Twitter expect a total overhaul?

We see Musk’s latest move in a less-than-benign light, as it gives him unprecedented power and influence over Twitter. He has mused about making several potential changes to the platform, including:

reshuffling the current management, in which he says he doesn’t have confidence

adding an edit button on tweets

weakening the current content moderation approach - including through supporting temporary suspensions on users rather than outright bans, and

potentially moving to a “freemium” model similar to Spotify’s, whereby users can pay to avoid more intrusive advertisements.

Shortly after becoming Twitter’s largest individual shareholder earlier this month, Musk said “I don’t care about the economics at all”.

But the bankers who lent him US$25.5 billion to eventually acquire the platform probably do. Musk may come under pressure to lift Twitter’s profitability. He claims his top priority is free speech – but potential advertisers may not want their products featured next to an extremist rant.

In recent years, Twitter has implemented a range of governance and content moderation policies. For example, in 2020 it broadened its “definition of harm” to address COVID-19 content contradicting guidance from authoritative sources.

Twitter claims developments in its content moderation approach have been to “serve the public conversation” and address disinformation and misinformation. It also claims to respond to user experiences of abuse and general incivility users must navigate.

Taking a longer-term view, however, it seems Twitter’s bolstering of content moderation could be seen as an effort to save its reputation following extensive backlash.

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 Musk’s ‘town square’ idea doesn’t hold up

Regardless of Twitter’s motivations Musk has openly challenged the growing number of moderation tools employed by the platform.

He has even labelled Twitter a “de facto public square”. This statement appears naïve at best. As communications scholar and Microsoft researcher Tarleton Gillespie argues, the notion that social media platforms can operate as truly open spaces is fantasy, given how platforms must moderate content while also disavowing this process.

Gillespie goes on to suggest platforms are obliged to moderate, to protect users from their antagonists, to remove offensive, vile, or illegal content and to ensure they can present their best face to new users, advertisers, partners, and the public more generally. He says the critical challenge then “is exactly when, how, and why to intervene”.

Platforms such as Twitter can’t represent “town squares” – especially as, in Twitter’s case, only a small proportion of the town is using the service.

Public squares are implicitly and explicitly regulated through social behaviours associated with relations in public, backed by the capacity to defer to an authority to restore public order should disorder arise. In the case of a private business, which Twitter now is, the final say will largely default to Musk.

Even if Musk were to implement his own town square ideal, it would presumably be a particularly free-wheeling version.

Providing users with more leeway in what they can say might contribute to increased polarity and further coarsen discourse on the platform. But this would again discourage advertisers – which would be an issue under Twitter’s current economic model (wherein 90% of revenue comes from advertising).

Free speech (but for all?)

Twitter is considerably smaller than other major social media networks. However, research has found it does have a disproportionate influence as tweets can proliferate with speed and virality, spilling over to traditional media.

The viewpoints users are exposed to are determined by algorithms geared towards maximising exposure and clicks, rather than enriching users’ lives with thoughtful or interesting points of view.

Musk has suggested he may make Twitter’s algorithms open source. This would be a welcome increase in transparency. But once Twitter becomes a private company, how transparent it is about operations will largely be up to Musk’s sole discretion.

Ironically, Musk has accused Meta (previously Facebook) CEO Mark Zuckerberg of having too much control over public debate.

Yet Musk himself has a history of trying to stifle his critics’ points of view. There’s little to suggest his actions are truly to create an open and inclusive town square through Twitter — and less yet to suggest it will be in the public interest.

Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram on Thursday took a dig at the Centre over the Rs 78,704 crore it owes to the states in GST compensation, saying it would be interesting to know why the Finance Ministry "embarrassed" Prime Minister Narendra Modi by putting out the information on the day he chose to "admonish" the states.

The Finance Ministry on Wednesday said the Centre has already released eight months of GST compensation dues to the states for the fiscal ended March 2022 and Rs 78,704 crore is pending due to inadequate balance in the cess fund.

On the day the prime minister exhorted states to cut the VAT rate on petrol and diesel, the Finance Ministry announced that the Centre owes Rs 78,704 crore to the states, Chidambaram said.

"The amount owed is actually more. If you add the amounts that the states claim are owed to them, the total amount may be bigger. Only the Controller of Government Accounts (CGA) can certify the correct amount," the former finance minister said on Twitter.

"It will be interesting to know why the MoF embarrassed the PM on the day he chose to admonish the States!" he said.

Flagging higher fuel prices in many opposition-ruled states, Prime Minister Modi on Wednesday called it "injustice" to people living there and urged the governments there to reduce VAT in "national interest" to benefit the common man.

Modi raised the issue of many states not adhering to the Centre's call for reducing the Value Added Tax (VAT) on petrol and diesel after his government slashed excise duties on them in November last, and asked them to work in the spirit of cooperative federalism in this time of global crisis.

In UP, nearly 11,000 unauthorised loudspeakers had been removed from religious places and volume of another 35,000 was set to permissible limits Pradesh following a government order, a senior police official said on Wednesday.

UP’s Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) Prashant Kumar had said a statewide drive was being undertaken to remove unauthorised loudspeakers from religious places and set the volume of others within permissible limits.

Raj Thackeray on Thursday in a message on Twitter said, “I wholeheartedly congratulate and stand grateful to the Yogi government for having removed the loudspeakers from religious places, specially the masjids.” “Unfortunately in Maharashtra we don’t have any ‘yogis’; what we have are ‘bhogis’ (hedonists). Here’s hoping and praying good sense prevails..” the MNS chief added.

Raj Thackeray recently gave an ultimatum to the Maharashtra government to remove loudspeakers from religious places, especially mosques, in the state by May 3, which has led to a political row in the state over the issue.

Raj Thackeray had in the past showered praise on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and batted for his candidature for the PM’s post in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.

Indonesia, the world’s biggest edible oils shipper, will widen an export ban to include crude palm oil, adding to uncertainty in a market that’s suffered dizzying price swings and threatening to worsen global food inflation.

The ban will be expanded to crude palm oil, RBD palm oil and used cooking oil, Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto said at a briefing Wednesday. A day earlier, he said the halt would only apply to palm olein. The policy will start on April 28 and last until domestic cooking oil prices ease.

Indonesia’s export policy has sent the palm oil industry into a tailspin. Prices have been whipsawed, rising one moment as the lack of details from the initial statement had traders fearing that the ban would cover all products, then slumping the next as details emerged that the move would be restricted to certain refined goods. Futures rallied 10% just before the latest announcement.

It is another example of a policy flip-flop that has raised concerns about Indonesia’s business image. The country is a major commodities supplier and had imposed restrictions on nickel and coal exports in the past. Speculation about what Indonesia may do next keeps the industry constantly on its toes.

Palm oil is processed and shipped in different forms. The fleshy, red fruits of the oil palm tree are crushed to produce crude palm oil. The product can be refined, bleached and deodorized to remove impurities. With further processing, palm olein is produced, which is the most widely used cooking oil in the world. The non-edible oils are used to make biodiesel and soap.The move by Indonesia, which accounts for a third of global edible oil exports, adds to a raft of crop protectionism around the world since the war in Ukraine erupted, as governments seek to protect their own food supply with agriculture prices surging. The ban threatens to further fan food inflation, which has been surging at a rampant pace, and raises the risk of a full-blown hunger crisis.

“Now we will enter the new bullish era where edible oil shortages will increase globally,” said Abdul Hameed, director of sales at Manzoor Trading in Pakistan. “Many countries will have to rely on their own crops and use domestic resources. There could be more crop protectionism happening.”

“Once the local need is fulfilled, surely I will revoke this export ban because I understand how the government needs taxes, needs overseas earnings, and needs a trade surplus,” said the president, known as Jokowi. “The people’s need is a more important priority.”