India’s fourteenth Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh passed away on Thursday at the age of 92. He was admitted to the AIIMS Delhi’s emergency unit after his health deteriorated. Singh, born on September 26, 1932, in Gah, Punjab (now in Pakistan), was one of the most prominent economic experts and political figures of the country. Before becoming the prime minister in 2004, Singh worked as an economic advisor, deputy chairman of the erstwhile planning commission, deputy governor in the Reserve Bank of India, chief economic adviser to the Government of India and more. Most notable of his work was his tenure as the Finance Minister under Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao’s government in 1991 and was most famous for the liberalization privatization and globalization (LPG) reforms in 1991. Below is a detailed timeline of his life and career from his birth to his death: Birth And Early Life On September 26, 1932, Dr. Manmohan Singh was born in Gah, a village in present-day Pakistan, to a Sikh family. After the partition of India in 1947, Singh and his family migrated to India, settling in Amritsar, Punjab. He completed his schooling in Amritsar and later moved to Delhi for higher education. In 1952, he pursued a Bachelor's degree in Economics from Panjab University in Chandigarh later completed his Master's degree in Economics from the prestigious University of Cambridge in the UK from 1954 to 1957. Post that, he earned a Doctor of Philosophy in Economics from the University of Oxford. Career From 1957 to 1965, Singh worked as a lecturer in Economics at Panjab University, Chandigarh. From 1969 to 1971, Singh worked as the professor of International Trade at Delhi School of Economics, Delhi University. From 1971 to 1972, he was the economic adviser with the Ministry of Foreign Trade. With his master over the craft, in 1976 he was appointed as the Chief Economic Adviser to the Government of India, contributing to the economic policy-making process. In 1982, Singh returned to RBI as a Deputy Governor Three years later, he was appointed as the Secretary in the Ministry of Finance and in 1987 he became the Secretary of the Department of Economic Affairs in the Ministry of Finance. As The Finance Minister The 1990s were a pivotal time for the Indian economy and Singh was the finance minister under Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao’s government. He was the architect of India's landmark economic reforms, which turned the economic landscape of India. One of the most notable contributions of Dr Singh was the the liberalization privatization and globalization or the LPG policy which opened the economic doors of India to the foreign world. Under his leadership as the FM, India witnessed substantial economic growth, moving from a closed, highly regulated economy to a market-driven one. He also worked to control India's fiscal deficit and stabilised the economy by adopting sound macroeconomic policies. As The PM Singh became the 14th Prime Minister of India after the Congress Party’s victory in the general elections. His tenure marks a shift towards further liberalization and modernization of the Indian economy. During his tenure, India experienced robust economic growth, averaging 8–9 per cent GDP growth per year. In 2005, Singh was instrumental in the landmark civil nuclear deal with the United States, which allowed India to access nuclear technology despite not being a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Singh’s government emphasised rural development, social security programs, and the implementation of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), which guarantees employment for rural workers. In 2009, he was re-elected as Prime Minister after the Congress Party won the general elections again. His second term continues the focused on inclusive economic growth and managing the global financial crisis of 2008. While remaining a Member of Parliament (MP) from 2014 to 2019, he largely stayed out of the public spotlight, occasionally commenting on key national issues such as economic reforms, the state of the Indian economy, and global affairs. Throughout his career, Dr Singh earned numerous accolades, including India’s second-highest civilian honor, the Padma Vibhushan (1987), the Asia Money Award for Finance Minister of the Year (1993, 1994), and the Euro Money Award for Finance Minister of the Year (1993). He was also the recipient of honorary degrees from several prestigious universities, including Cambridge and Oxford.
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The Acer Swift 16 AI looks like a piece of slate. Without the Acer logo on the cover, I would swear the laptop looks like something you’d pick up from a construction site. The Swift 16 AI with the latest Lunar Lake chips is an effective machine, but it’s let down by build issues that don’t match its performance ambitions. The big reason you would want the Swift 16 over the Swift 14 is the sweet, 16-inch AMOLED. At the least, it is a nice and pretty screen. Either way, Acer promises nearly 20-hour actual use battery life and all the Copilot+ PC goodness in a thin package. That thin package also has issues when I push down on its keyboard. It’s bendy and surprisingly uncomfortable. I also have issues with the sound quality of its twin speakers and its battery life, which doesn’t quite match the promise of this machine. I would have loved to see if it could hold an Intel Core Ultra 9 chip like all its promotional material says, but that may not be available before the end of 2024. If the screen is all you want, the Acer Swift 16 AI has that, but for a price. Still, at $1,200 MSRP, you may find far better build quality elsewhere. Acer Swift 16 AI Review: Build Quality I want to like the Swift 16 AI for its low-key color, thin body, and 3.37-pound light frame, but Acer’s design has serious structural flaws. There are plenty of I/O ports for this shape and size, with an HDMI, two USB-A, and two Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports. I also appreciate the WiFi 7 connectivity, numpad, and 1 TB SSD, suggesting this could be a great workhorse laptop. Setting up this workhorse is another matter. The chassis has a noticeable sag when you press too hard on the keys, and it’s also noticeable around the area where you rest your palms. It’s a shame because the rest of the device, including the cover, feels sturdy. Essentially, most of the structure is held by the sides of the device, but the middle is especially bendy. Pressing the area closest to the screen with a modicum of force can sink close to half an inch. The keyboard also has some idiosyncrasies. The keys aren’t clacky but have a mechanical, rubbery noise that’s not unpleasant, just different. On a desk, it’s easy to type using my usually forceful style, but typing from my lap feels like it takes too much effort. The mousepad also feels nice, but it’s occasionally let down with some palm rejection issues. Nobody likes typing a paragraph only to find that your cursor has moved and clicked on another part of your document. At least it’s thin, which can also be said about the Acer Swift 16 Go from earlier this year. At least the screen can lie flat, and you have touchscreen capabilities. Otherwise, it all feels too substandard. Acer Swift 16 AI Review: Performance My configuration came with the Intel Core Ultra 256 V Lunar Lake processor launched in September, incorporating ARC 140V onboard graphics. Acer’s press materials and its product page promote how this PC can house up to an Intel Core Ultra 9 288V, currently the most powerful of Intel’s new Lunar Lake chips. I would have loved to see it in action with Acer’s slim laptop, but my unit uses the mid-to-low-end 256V. At the time of reporting, Acer’s store page for the 16-inch doesn’t stock any other options for the higher-end chip. At the very least, the 16-inch chassis does have slightly improved performance over the 14-inch models from other OEMs with the same chip. The 256V from Intel is still a good chip for its core counts compared to chips with more cores and threads, but for a few hundred dollars more, you can find similar laptops with the 258V, though it may still not perform as well in some multi-core tests compared to the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite. As for how it compares to the M4 MacBook Pro, there’s really no beating Apple’s strength in pure benchmarking. In Cinebench scores, the Acer Swift 16 AI was sizably better than a 14-inch laptop with the same chip as the Asus Zenbook S 14 and the Dell XPS 13 . Still, it lagged behind the Snapdragon X Elite and a MacBook Air’s M3 chip in pure rendering performance. That difference becomes more stark in 3DMark graphics tests. The Arc 140V graphics are good enough for some purposes but not for any real heavy lifting. In our Blender benchmarks, where we get the PC to render a scene of a BMW stressing the CPU and GPU individually, the Intel chip takes about 4 minutes and 40 seconds, which isn’t bad. Still, this PC will certainly not be the best fit for a designer, despite the lovely display. The 256V still lags far behind in our transcoding test. We used the open-source Handbrake program to transcode a 4K movie into 1080p, which still took more than three minutes longer than an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370, the top end of Strix Point. This PC is great at productivity tasks but not more intensive activities. Acer Swift 16 AI Review: Screen, Sound, and Webcam The big reason you get the 16-inch over the 14-inch Swift model is the 3K OLED display. It’s a luxurious touchscreen you can muddy with your oily fingerprints. It can reach a max resolution of 2880 by 1800 and a peak full-screen brightness of 340 nits. It’s not the brightest screen, and you might lose some fidelity in direct light, but it’s a satisfying viewing experience for regular use. If you want this to be your favorite mobile machine for watching movies, I’d recommend investing in a good pair of headphones. The audio from the Acer Swift 16 AI sounded thin and too tinny. The device is supposed to contain two stereo speakers, but even with that at max volume, it didn’t have much bass. I don’t find webcams to be a very exciting part of the laptop puzzle. I don’t think anybody cares about your visual quality during the week’s 4th subsequent Zoom meeting. Still, the Swift 16 AI does include a QHD webcam that can show a resolution of 2560 by 1440. I used the Swift 16 AI during a video call and found the image quality was fairly detailed, even in relatively dim light. Acer’s webcams also include a popup for its PureView and PureVoice. This software is supposed to use AI to enhance the clarity of your image and the sound of your voice. If it helped all the other people on the other end of the call, I couldn’t tell. Nor could I see much difference with it at my end. That’s fine, and I don’t mind it running in the background. However, the popup screen for PureView kept reappearing multiple times during my call. Acer Swift 16 AI Review: Battery Life After about three hours of work using Google Chrome for basic browsing tasks, I was sitting at around 50%. Even with Windows’s power settings on Balanced mode on medium screen brightness, I was sitting at around 50%. Acer promises you can get about 13 and a half hours of browsing, though it may be less if you use performance-hog browsers like Google Chrome. It’s not a 20-hour battery life, but it’s fair enough for most work purposes. I can get close to a full day from it with constant use. In our battery tests, where we ran the laptop on basic power settings at low brightness with a 24-hour YouTube video, the Acer Swift 16 AI went from 55% battery to 0 in close to 8 hours. It’s close, but not quite the 19.5-hour video playback battery life promised by Acer. The 70Whr battery and Lunar Lake give you decent mileage but won’t tide you over multiple days of constant use. Acer Swift 16 AI Review: Verdict If I had the choice of a thin Intel Lunar Lake laptop, the Swift 16 AI wouldn’t be my first choice. It doesn’t have the build quality I would expect when spending over $1,000. Its screen is very nice, though not very bright. Otherwise, it doesn’t have the qualities you look for in a laptop at this price point, save for—to some extent—battery life. I don’t find much reason to spend $1,000 on a device that bends so much when using it.PM Modi lauds \'Rashtriya Bal Puraskar Award\'-winning children, interacts with awardeesAs the new year dawns, investors will be awaiting eagerly to see if Lalatech, the parent of on-demand logistics and delivery platform Lalamove, goes ahead with a mega Hong Kong initial public offering after applying to list for a fourth time amid improved market sentiment. The company, which operates under the Huolala brand in mainland China, submitted its listing application in October, following previous attempts in April this year as well as November and March of 2023, after shifting its US$1 billion (HK$7.8 billion) listing plan from the US to Hong Kong in 2021. Founded in Hong Kong in 2013, Lalatech mainly operates as a marketplace, especially in intra-city freight markets, connecting merchants with carriers through an asset-light business model, meaning it does not own the vehicles used by carriers. Entering China and other markets in 2014, the company now is the world's largest logistics transaction platform by closed-loop freight gross transaction value or GTV in the first half of this year, with a market share of 53.9 percent, according to its preliminary prospectus, citing data from consultancy Frost & Sullivan. Mainland power Lalatech facilitated about 338 million orders with a freight GTV of US$4.6 billion in the first six months of the year. It had an average of 15.2 million monthly active merchants and 1.4 million monthly active carriers on its platform during this period. Despite its global presence in over 400 cities across 11 markets, over 90 percent of Lalatech's revenue still comes from mainland China. Its revenue grew 18 percent in the first half of 2024 to US$709 million, building on a 28.8 percent increase to US$1.3 billion for the full year in 2023. It has turned profitable after years of losses, which swung to a net profit of US$972.7 million in 2023, followed by a US$183.7 million net profit in the first half of 2024. The company attributed its profitability to an improved hybrid monetization model for its freight platform services, which accounted for 61.8 percent of its revenue in the first half of 2024. Initially reliant on carrier membership fees for revenue, Lalatech introduced commission fees in 2018 as its carrier base expanded. In Shenzhen, for example, it offers three membership tiers for carriers operating specific vehicle types. First-tier members, paying 239 yuan per month, enjoy a reduced commission rate of 14 percent compared to the 18 percent rate for non-members. The second tier, with a 539 yuan monthly fee, faces an 11 percent commission rate, while third-tier members, paying 789 yuan per month, see their rate drop to 8 percent. This hybrid monetization model has helped drive profitability by converting GTV growth into revenue growth, according to the company. Commissions as a percentage of freight platform services revenue in China increased from 11.7 percent in 2021 to 57 percent in 2023, rising further to 58.5 percent in 2024. However, questions remain about the sustainability of its model. Mainland regulators have summoned the company a dozen times in recent years over complaints related to payment delays for carriers, arbitrarily adjusted pricing rules, and high commission rates and membership fees, according to mainland media reports Lalatech's other revenue streams include a range of diversified logistics services like solutions to large enterprise merchants or home-moving services, which contributed 32 percent of revenue in the first half. The company has raised a total of US$2.66 billion in 11 financing rounds from big-name investors including Hillhouse Capital and HongShan, formerly known as Sequoia China. Other investors, such as Tencent (0700) hold small stakes. ENTREPRENEURIAL SPIRIT Founder and chairman Chow Shing-yuk, retains about 25 percent of Lalatech's shares along with his family trust, despite selling US$165 million worth of shares to investors in 2021 and 2022. Born in Guangdong province, Chow moved to Hong Kong as a child. Despite growing up in a humble wooden house as Chow recalled in an interview, he excelled academically, winning a scholarship to study in the US, where he studied economics at Stanford University. After university, Chow joined Bain & Company as a consultant but quickly left the corporate world to pursue an unconventional path, becoming a professional Texas Hold'em poker player. Chow was said to have amassed nearly HK$30 million in winnings during his time as a poker player, which provided part of the capital for his entrepreneurial ventures, which he described as "the biggest gamble of his life." Lalatech also repurchased US$65.2 million worth of shares from Chow in February last year, and based on that price, the company would be valued at US$9.8 billion, according to The Standard's calculation, down from a valuation of nearly US$13 billion for its 11th financing completed in early 2022. Whether Lalatech can maintain the latest valuation remains in doubt as peers such as GoGoX (2246) and Full Truck Alliance have both performed disappointingly after going public. Its smaller rival GoGoX shares prices have plunged by nearly 98 percent since its IPO in June 2022, resulting in a market capitalization of HK$282.82 million, compared to over HK$10 billion before listing. Its US-listed competitor Full Truck Alliance, which mainly focuses on inter-city freight services, also posted a 53 percent decline in prices since its listing in 2021. Full Truck's market cap now stood at US$9.3 billion. Lalatech plans to use the proceeds from the IPO to grow its core business and expand service offerings in China, accelerate global expansion, enhance technology infrastructure, and support working capital. Goldman Sachs, BofA Securities, and JP Morgan are joint sponsors for the proposed offering.
NEW YORK and AMSTERDAM , Dec. 13, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- S&P Dow Jones Indices ("S&P DJI"), the world's leading index provider, today announced the results of the annual Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI) rebalancing and reconstitution. The DJSI are float-adjusted market capitalization weighted indices that measure the performance of companies selected using environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria. The DJSI, including the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index (DJSI World), were launched in 1999 as the pioneering series of global sustainability benchmarks available in the market. The index family is comprised of global, regional and country benchmarks. As a result of this year's review, the following top three largest companies based on free-float market capitalization have been added to and deleted from the DJSI World. All changes are effective on Monday, December 23, 2024 . Additions: Airbus SE, Schlumberger Ltd, BAE Systems Plc Deletions: Alphabet Inc 1 , UnitedHealth Group Inc, ASML Holding NV 2 The full results and list of DJSI constituents will be available as of Monday, December 23 2024 , at https://www.spglobal.com/esg/csa/djsi-annual-review S&P Dow Jones Indices will be renaming a number of its sustainability and ESG-related indices (see Index Announcement ). As part of this update, the family of Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI) will be renamed Dow Jones Best-in-Class Indices. The changes will become effective on Monday, February 10, 2025 . The S&P Global CSA Scores will continue to be a key factor in selecting constituents for the DJSI when they are renamed Dow Jones Best-in-Class Indices in February 2025 . For more information about the DJSI methodology, please visit: www.spglobal.com/spdji . ABOUT S&P DOW JONES INDICES S&P Dow Jones Indices is the largest global resource for essential index-based concepts, data and research, and home to iconic financial market indicators, such as the S&P 500® and the Dow Jones Industrial Average®. More assets are invested in products based on our indices than products based on indices from any other provider in the world. Since Charles Dow invented the first index in 1884, S&P DJI has been innovating and developing indices across the spectrum of asset classes helping to define the way investors measure and trade the markets. S&P Dow Jones Indices is a division of S&P Global (NYSE: SPGI), which provides essential intelligence for individuals, companies, and governments to make decisions with confidence. For more information, visit: www.spglobal.com/spdji . 1 Still member of DJSI World Enlarged and DJSI North America 2 Still member of DJSI World Enlarged S&P DJI MEDIA CONTACTS: spdji.comms@spglobal.com View original content: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/sp-dow-jones-indices-announces-dow-jones-sustainability-indices-2024-review-results-302331745.html SOURCE S&P Dow Jones Indices
MUMBAI: The city has been ranked first in the Maharashtra District Good Governance Index 2024 report unveiled by chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on Thursday. It achieved this status for its good governance in the commerce and industries sector, while Mumbai suburban has been ranked second for its good governance in the public health sector. Mumbai city and its suburbs were also ranked in the top two positions in the economic governance and justice and security sectors. With the help of the Centre, the state government has begun evaluating “good governance” in all Maharashtra’s districts. The performance of each district was evaluated in ten different sectors of the state on as many as 161 indicators. The first report was unveiled on Thursday. The chief minister’s office released the names of the five districts and cities in the top five positions in ten different sectors in the index report. The ten sectors are: agriculture and allied sectors, commerce and industry, human resource development, public health, infrastructure development, social development, economic governance, justice and security, environment, and citizen-centric administration. According to the report, in the commerce and industry sector, after Mumbai it is Raigad, Pune, Palghar and Thane in the next four positions. In the public health sector, Sindhudurg is first while Palghar, Beed and Ratnagiri have been ranked third, fourth and fifth for good governance. In the sphere of economic governance, after Mumbai suburban and Mumbai city come Raigad, Jalgaon and Bhandara in the third, fourth and fifth positions. Similarly, Nagpur, Gadchiroli and Raigad districts have been ranked at third, fourth and fifth positions in the justice and security sector after Mumbai suburban and Mumbai city. Curiously, Mumbai does not figure in good governance in the infrastructure development sector despite having the maximum infrastructure-related projects of all cities across Maharashtra. The top five districts in this sector are Latur, Nashik, Buldhana, Chandrapur and Hingoli. Equally curiously, Mumbai city and Mumbai suburban have found a space in good governance in the environment sector, where they have been ranked fourth and fifth after Sangli, Chhatrapati Sambhaji Nagar and Solapur. Commenting on the report, the chief minister said that the progress of a state depended on its ‘ease of living’. “The government is continuously working to improve the ease of living for the people,” he stated. “Good governance is reflected in how promptly the citizens receive government services. Good governance will strengthen the path towards achieving our goal of a trillion-dollar economy.”NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The right frame can freeze a moment in time, creating meaning for the masses from a fist pump over a bloodied ear , a bridge crumbled by a ship , towns shredded by nature , and a victory sealed with an on-field kiss . In 2024, photographers across the U.S. captured glimpses of humanity, ranging from a deeply divisive presidential election , to hurricanes and fires that ravaged communities, to campus protests over the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. The gallery from The Associated Press illustrates a new chapter of political history — the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump , the moment President Joe Biden announced he would no longer run again , the campaign sprint by Vice President Kamala Harris in Biden’s place, and the raw emotion from voters during a grueling contest ultimately won by Trump . Related Articles National News | Today in History: December 7, Japan attacks Pearl Harbor National News | Connecticut court upholds $965 million verdict against Alex Jones in Sandy Hook National News | USDA orders nationwide testing of milk for bird flu to halt the virus National News | More than a million oven gloves are being recalled after consumers report 92 minor burns National News | Here’s where police are being investigated for excessive force, discrimination and other allegations Hurricanes whipped through the country with devastating imagery, leaving a path of wreckage and death from Florida to Appalachia . After Hurricane Helene , Lake Lure in North Carolina was shown in a jarring photo covered in shards of debris thick enough to hide the surface of the water. Hurricane Milton ripped apart the roof of Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida, home to Major League Baseball’s Tampa Bay Rays. The scale of destruction experienced in some corners of the country in 2024 was hard to capture and might have been harder to fathom. That was the case when a container ship slammed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, causing it to collapse and crumple around the vessel, killing construction workers on the bridge. As flames torched the landscape in California , another image captured firefighters and sheriff’s deputies pushing a vintage car away from a burning home. Elsewhere in California , one photo is aglow with bright orange flames, broken up only by the subtle features of an animal running through them. But hope also persevered in the face of devastation. In Helene’s aftermath , an image from Crystal River, Florida, shows Dustin Holmes holding hands with his girlfriend, Hailey Morgan, as they sloshed through floodwaters with her 4- and 7-year-old children to return to their flooded home. And in Manasota Key, Florida, a family was lit up by the glow of flashlights as they walked to check on their home damaged by Milton. Other photos from 2024 also grabbed the darkness and shadows to emphasize light: among them, a rocket liftoff and a total solar eclipse . And, yes, eclipse glasses were back in style for a shared moment of skygazing. But many other photos delivered a blast of color, from the spectrum of the northern lights across a Maine sky to a crew of workers wading into the deep-red of a Massachusetts cranberry bog . And, once again, Taylor Swift captured the country’s attention, even as a part of the crowd. She rushed down from the stands to kiss her boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, after the Chiefs won the AFC Championship , en route to another Super Bowl win. Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Click to share on X (Opens in new window) Most Popular Hampton’s superintendent just got a massive raise. Here’s how it compares. 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Then the Norfolk judge increased it. An appeals court ruled there were issues with a man’s sentencing. Then the Norfolk judge increased it. Trending Nationally Killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO spotlights complex challenge companies face in protecting top brass MAGA influencer Nick Fuentes charged with battery of woman he maced: report ‘America’s Got Talent’ comedian Kabir ‘Kabeezy’ Singh dead at 39 Police may search a vehicle based on the smell of raw cannabis, Illinois Supreme Court rules ‘Oppenheimer’ actor Emma Dumont comes out as transmasculine, changes name