January 31: Top news at 3 pm

Developing news

*Indian Union Muslim League MP for Malappuram E Ahamed suffered a cardiac arrest in Parliament during the President's address; his condition is critical, said sources at RML Hospital in the capital.

Economic Survey: GDP to be lower at 6.5% in FY17; rebound next fiscal

India's economic growth has been pegged at 6.5% for the current fiscal, down from 7.6% recorded in the last financial year, but is expected to rebound in the range of 6.75-7.5% in 2017-18. The Economic Survey for 2016-17, tabled in Parliament by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on the opening day of the Budget Session, underlined the need for more reforms. The Survey's GDP growth figure for the current fiscal is lower than 7.1% the Central Statistics Office had forecast earlier this month. The Survey lists some of the challenges that might impede India’s progress. These include ambivalence about property rights and the private sector, deficiencies in state capacity, especially in delivering essential services and inefficient redistribution.

H-1B reform bill introduced in US House of Representatives

The ‘High-Skilled Integrity and Fairness Act of 2017’ introduced in the US House of Representatives calls for more than doubling the minimum salary of H-1B visa holders to $130,000, among other things, making it difficult for firms to use the programme to replace American employees with foreign workers, including from India.
This is more than double the current H-1B minimum wage of $60,000, established in 1989. "My legislation refocuses the H-1B programme to its original intent to seek out and find the best and brightest from around the world, and to supplement the US workforce with talented, highly-paid, and highly-skilled workers who help create jobs here in America, not replace them," said California Congressman Zoe Lofgren, who introduced the bill.

Indian IT stocks fell with news of the bill’s introduction.

9 Dalits injured in attack in Hisar village

Nine Dalits were injured when nearly 20 persons allegedly attacked them following an argument in Mirchpur village, Hisar district, Haryana from where CRPF troops were withdrawn only last month, six years after two people were burnt alive in inter-caste violence. The villagers were last night watching a cycle show when some persons present there allegedly passed a caste-related comment on a Dalit youth who had won a race, police said today. When the Dalits objected, a group of people belonging to another community allegedly attacked them, they said. One injured was admitted to Agroha Medical College while five others were taken to the civil hospital with simple injuries, Superintendent of Police Rajender Kumar Meena said. After the incident, a large number of Dalits gathered outside of the Mirchpur Police Chowki and held a demonstration and raised slogans against the police, police said. A case under sections 148, 149, 323, 324 of IPC and under the SC/ST Act has been registered against 15 persons in Narnaund Police Station last night.

ED orders probe as CCTV footage of IO with estranged wife of accused emerges

CCTV grabs purportedly showing Enforcement Directorate's Kolkata-based nodal Investigating Officer (IO) allegedly checking-in to a Delhi hotel with the estranged wife of the main accused in a chit fund scam, has prompted the agency to order a probe into his role and remove the officer from all cases. The video and photo grabs were shown last night on some West Bengal news channels, which claimed that the footage allegedly revealed that the duo travelled together by air from Kolkata to Delhi last month and later together checked into a hotel in the Sunder Nagar area of the national capital. The ED said it has ordered a probe and "strict disciplinary action" will follow if charges are proved true, adding that the IO was based at the ED's regional office in Kolkata and was investigating prominent cases like the Saradha and the Rose Valley chit fund scams. The footage of the duo was obtained by the Kolkata Police as part of its separate investigation against the activities of certain hawala dealers post demonetisation.

Obama criticises Trump over immigration policies

Breaking his silence over his successor Donald Trump's immigration policies, former US President Barack Obama today said he disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion. "As we've heard before the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion," Obama's spokesman Kevin Lewis said in a statement. This is the first press statement issued by the office of Barack Obama after he left the office 10 days ago. Trump's executive order bars citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for the next 90 days, suspends the admission of all refugees for 120 days and indefinitely suspends the Syrian refugee programme.