Woman orders cake online, loses ₹71,500 to fraudster

02/12/2019, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT,BENGALURU

Ordering a cake online has cost a 37-year-old woman ₹71,500.

Radha Prakash, an employee with a PSU in Bengaluru, told the Cubbon Park police, with whom she registered a complaint, that she had ordered the cake online from a shop on Lavelle Road on Friday afternoon.

Collects details

Soon after, a man claiming to be an employee called her back to confirm the order and allegedly offered to help her with the online transaction. In the process, he managed to get all her details such as bank account number, one-time password (OTP), etc. Within minutes after she put down the phone, Radha received a transaction alert on her mobile phone stating that ₹71,500 has been debited from her account.

She tried to call the shop but got no response.

Police advice


Almost every day the police receive complaints of such online frauds. “In almost all the cases, the fraudsters are able to get the victims to give them their bank and card details and the OTP that the bank sends them. We urge people not to share the OTPs with anyone, including people who claim to be from a bank,” said a senior police official.

The Cubbon Park police have taken up a case under various sections of the I-T Act and are investigating.

Revenue from Taj Mahal rises

Pollution impacting the 17th century monument, says govt.

02/12/2019

Historic upkeep: A view of the Taj Mahal in Agra, Uttar Pradesh

PTI

The revenue earned from the Taj Mahal in Agra went up around four times over five years ending in 2018-2019, according to data given by the Union Ministry of Culture to the Lok Sabha in the ongoing session of Parliament.

To a question by Assam MP Badruddin Ajmal, Culture Minister Prahlad Singh Patel informed the House on November 18 that the revenue generated from the UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2018-2019 was ₹86,48,93,100 from 70,90,207 visitors.

The previous year, the revenue was ₹58,76,04,981 from 65,65,627 visitors, up from ₹55,09,29,860 from 61,77,196 visitors in 2016-2017. In 2015-2016, the Taj Mahal generated ₹17,92,27,050 from 50,70,573 visitors and in 2014-2015, was lower than ₹21,23,55,330 in 2014-2015 when 60,89,901 visitors were recorded.

The expenditure on the maintenance of the 17th century tomb increased to ₹5,48,34,582 in 2018-2019 from ₹3,38,42,927 in 2017-2018, according to the reply. The Ministry, under which the Archaeological Survey of India functions, had spent ₹4,50,45,819 in 2016-2017 and ₹3,28,37,534 in 2015-2016.

Effects of pollution

Asked by Mr. Ajmal whether pollution was discolouring the white marble structure, the Minister replied: “The effect of pollution is there, but the monument is cleaned periodically.”

Recently, there have been concerns about the discolouration of the facade.

‘Passenger trains to run up to 160 kmph in a few years’

Increasing the speed will take five to 10 years, depending on infrastructure development, says Railway Board Chairman

02/12/2019, , V. GEETANATH,HYDERABAD

Vinod Kumar Yadav

The Indian Railways is poised for a major structural and operational transformation in the next few years, with passenger trains slated to be run at 160 kmph in the Mumbai-Delhi-Kolkata sector and freight trains to be run at 100 kmph.

Towards the South, in the Delhi-Chennai, Kharagpur-Vijayawada sectors, the plan is to run passenger trains up to 130 kmph. Increasing the speed up to 160 kmph will take five to 10 years, depending on infrastructural development, said Railway Board Chairman Vinod Kumar Yadav.

‘Run on demand’

“Our vision is to see that trains, passenger and freight, are run on demand in the Mumbai-Delhi-Kolkata sector by upgrading our capacities. We have divided major works into super critical and critical categories, to complete them in the next two to five years,” he said during his recent visit to the city to inaugurate the Financial Management Institute.

Instructions were issued to increase the speed of all passenger trains to 110 kmph and move this to 130 kmph within the next two to three years in the South, where average speeds reach between 45 kmph and 110 kmph.

‘Super critical’

About 76% of the ‘super critical’ works were complete and the remaining 24%, requiring about ₹7,500 crore, was expected to be completed within a year or so. There were works where 91% was yet to be done in the ‘critical’ category, costing up to ₹85,000. This includes doubling and tripling lines, and traffic facilities at various locations across the country. This is scheduled to be done in three years and funds were being sourced.

“This will give us tremendous mobility. We have identified the works based on the need for efficient operations and also economic considerations like freight movement,” he said.

Freight corridor

The most important development would be completion of the freight corridor of about 3,000 km, between Mumbai-Delhi-Kolkata, by December 2021.

“Prime Minister Narendra Modi took the initiative to call up the Chief Ministers of Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh to remove certain bottlenecks,” he said.

Retirement age of TSRTC employees increased

02/12/2019,HYDERABAD

An increase in the retirement age of Telangana State Road Transport Corporation staff from 58 to 60 and payment of their September salary

and wages for the strike period from October 5 to November 28 in one instalment were among the several decisions announced by Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao at a meeting with a cross-section of them at a luncheon on Sunday. He also allayed
their apprehensions of privatisation of the RTC.

Ambur girl becomes brand ambassador for Rotary’s WinS programme

02/12/2019, STAFF REPORTER,CHENNAI

One fine day, seven-year-old Hanifa Zaara from Ambur walked up to her mother and said she was planning to file a police complaint against her father for not building a toilet inside their house. Aghast, her mother refused. But Zaara did not give up, and quietly walked to the station and spoke to the sub-inspector, who was shocked as well.

He immediately called her father and the municipality officials. “They took my complaint and built a toilet in a day’s time [under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana]. And I am not the only one who has got it. Now, nearly 100 families near my residence have a toilet too,” she says with a beaming smile.

Now, she has become the ‘Swachch Ambassador’ for the Ambur Municipality, and on Sunday, she was also made the ‘Ambassador of WinS programme of Rotary’.

The Rotary Club’s Wash-in-Schools (WinS) programme was started in 2017 to celebrate the 100th year of the Rotary Foundation, as a pilot project that aimed to ensure schoolchildren got pure drinking water, gender-segregated toilets and handwash stations.

No distance education in hotel management: UGC

02/12/2019,NEW DELHI

The University Grants Commission (UGC) has prohibited distance education programmes in Hotel Management and Real Estate. “Programmes in Hotel Management, Culinary Studies and Real Estate, will not be recognised from 2019-20,” an order said. PTI

Private telecom players hike rates, prepaid users to be hit
Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea and Reliance Jio announce up to 40% increase

02/12/2019, PIYUSH PANDEY,MUMBAI

The era of low tariffs for Indian consumers seems to have ended as major telcos — Vodafone Idea Limited (VIL), Bharti Airtel Limited and Reliance Jio — have increased tariffs by up to 40% for prepaid customers.

While VIL and Sunil Bharti Mittal-led Bharti Airtel have decided to hike the tariffs with effect from December 3, Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio has decided to implement the hike from December 6.

90% of market

The three telecommunication giants together account for over 90% of India’s 1.18 billion mobile subscribers, with the market share of around 30% each split evenly among them. “New plans will be available across India starting 00:00 hours of December 3, 2019,” a Vodafone Idea statement said.

Bharti Airtel’s statement read: “Airtel’s new plans represent tariff increases in the range of a mere 50 paise/day to ₹2.85/day and offer generous data and calling benefits.”

Both Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel announced new prepaid plans starting with options of 2 days, 28 days, 84 days and 365 days validity and prices starting from ₹19 and going upto ₹2,399. Reliance Jio is yet to announce its new plans.

Reliance Jio’s new tariffs will be priced 40% higher, but the company promises to offer 300% more benefits to its customers. “Jio will be introducing new all-in-one plans with unlimited voice and data. These plans will have a fair usage policy for calls to other mobile networks. The new plans will be effective from 6th December 2019,” the company said in a statement.

The hike in tariffs comes after VIL and Bharti Airtel posted record quarterly losses of ₹50,922 crore and ₹23,045 crore respectively owing to an adverse Supreme Court ruling on the adjusted gross revenue (AGR).

Outstanding debt

Both Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel also have an outstanding debt of over ₹1 lakh crore each.

According to government data, the liabilities in the case of Bharti Airtel add up to nearly ₹35,586 crore, of which ₹21,682 crore is the licence fee and another ₹13,904.01 crore is the spectrum usage charge (SUC) dues (excluding the dues of Telenor and Tata Teleservices). Vodafone Idea has an estimated liability of ₹44,150 crore post the Supreme Court order and made provisioning of ₹25,680 crore in the second quarter this fiscal.

Commenting on the hike, Chief Marketing Officer of Bharti Airtel Shashwat Sharma said the operator’s new mobile plans offered “tremendous value” and “a superior network experience” on the 4G network.