News Digest: Coming Soon, Random Checks at All Airports

Here are some headlines from the daily newspapers

1. Coming soon, random checks at all airports

As the authorities are already drawing standard operating procedures in this regard, it won’t be long before vehicles entering the airport premises and travellers’ luggage in the terminal are subjected to random inspections. A plan to monitor travellers inside the building is also on the cards, reports Hindustan Times.

Besides this, the Centre intends to construct additional lanes to the airport, so security personnel can easily pull out vehicles they intend to check without hindering traffic movement.

2. Nothing average about next year's maths paper

There will be more easy and difficult questions and less of average questions in mathematics in the next board exams, reports The Times of India.

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has tweaked the difficulty level of the mathematics paper for next year's Class XII board exam. The board's new paper design has increased the marks for `easy' and `difficult' level questions by 5% each, while it has decreased the marks of `average' questions by 10%. The new paper will also have less number of `very short' and `short' answers as well as less marks for the `value-based questions'. The paper will be of 100 marks.

3. Ola Shuts Down TaxiForSure Business, Lays Off 700 Staff

Ola has shut down its TaxiForSure business and has laid off 700 employees, according to three people directly aware of the developments at India's largest cab aggregator, reports The Economic Times.

The move comes nearly a year and half after Ola acquired its crosstown rival TaxiForSure for $200 million to gain market leadership against rival Uber, the most-valuable startup in the world.

4. Rakhis across Indo-Pak border take a detour

Separated sisters and brothers in India and Pakistan are routing their siblins sg love this raksha band han through neutral addresses—London and Dubai—because of growing hostilities between the two neighbouring nations, reports The Hindustan Times.

A large number of people in India and Pakistan, separated from their loved ones during Partition in 1947, exchange their raksha band han love through government postal or private courier services.

5. AMU slams U-turn on minority status

The Aligarh Muslim University has criticised the NDA government's decision to withdraw the Centre’s appeal against a 2006 Allahabad High Court decision which denied the historic institution minority status, reports The Hindu.

Slamming the NDA government's u-turn, the AMU Registrar quoted Sardar Vallabhai Patel's report in the Constituent Assembly Debates stating that it was “up to the Majority community to create by its generosity a sense of confidence in the Minorities”.

6. I-T returns: Top 1% earned 18% of income

The top 1 per cent of earning individuals who filed tax returns earned about 18 per cent of the total income in financial year 2011-12, according to the latest data on income tax released by the income-tax department recently, reports The Business Standard.

“Once sufficient amount of data is generated, we will be able to generate analytics based on the requirements of various stakeholders,” Navin Kumar, chairman, GSTN, told Business Standard in a recent interview.

The bottom half of the earning individuals earned just about 21 per cent of the total income shown in the returns, the data showed, highlighting stark income inequality.

7. GST platform to become analytics powerhouse

The Goods and Services Tax Network, the information technology backbone that will implement the new indirect tax regime, will become a data analytics powerhouse in the months after the roll-out, reports The Business Standard.

“Once sufficient amount of data is generated, we will be able to generate analytics based on the requirements of various stakeholders,” Navin Kumar, chairman, GSTN, told Business Standard in a recent interview.

8. Cotton yield is expected to rise this season

Even as the area under cotton has come down this kharif season, the production in the key cotton growing States could still be higher during the 2016-17 marketing season than in 2015-16.

This is because of better yields expected in good weather, reports The Hindu.

In North India, Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan are the major cotton-producing States. After the genetically modified cotton crop suffered a huge damage last year in Punjab and Haryana from the whitefly pest attack, farmers have cut down on area under cotton this season.

9. 500 birds injured in 3 days

The Jain Temple Charitable Bird Hospital, opposite the historic Red Fort, has been under tremendous strain for the last three days. As many as 500 birds injured by maanja were treated at the hospital, reports The Hindu

Sunil Jain, manager of the hospital, said: “The number is likely to cross 1,000 by the end of this week. This is a frightening scenario.” Maanja are kite strings that have glass shreds or are made of nylon. They are popular as they ensure that kites don’t get cut easily, and fly higher.

10. Customs makes filling declaration form optional at Delhi airport

Running out of space to keep 25,000 declaration forms it collects every day, the customs department has asked airlines to tell passengers it is not mandatory to fill it, reports Hindustan Times.

The customs said fliers from abroad should fill the forms only if they want to declare anything or are carrying prohibited items.

The department has decided to revisit its two-year-old order of asking passengers to submit a declaration before leaving Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA). 25,000 passengers arrive at the airport every day.