In less than a fortnight of forming the new coalition government in Nepal, slight chinks in behaviour have begun to be noticed between the newly appointed Prime Minister, Pushpa Kamal Dahal popularly known as Prachanda, and his coalition partner KP Sharma also referred to as 'Oli'.

While Prachanda won the vote of confidence in Nepal’s Parliament on January 10th, which his former ally and now opposition member Sher Bahadur Deuba also supported, there are a few instances which have raised eyebrows.

The 16th edition of India’s Auto Expo was all about electric vehicles (EVs) as leading players - Maruti Suzuki, Hyundai and Tata Motors - unveiled an array of battery-powered vehicles.

Car makers are transitioning from internal combustion engine vehicles to cleaner options.   Electric car sales in India grew over 200% to about 38,000 units in CY2022, as per official data.

However, its penetration in overall passenger vehicle (PV) sales was minuscule at about 1%. India’s largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki (MSIL) showcased a concept electric SUV- eVX- at the Expo. The EV, which is a mid-size electric SUV developed by Suzuki Motor Corporation( Japan), is powered by a 60kWh battery pack offering up to 550km of driving range.

Kia commits Rs 2,000 crore investment

South Korean carmaker Kia has committed an investment of Rs 2,000 crore over the next four years to scale up its presence in the electric vehicle segment in the country. Currently, Kia sells a single electric vehicle model in India and has plans to introduce a locally manufactured product in 2025. 

Aiming to strengthen digital payment ecosystem, the Cabinet on  Jan 11 approved a Rs 2,600 crore scheme for promoting RuPay debit cards and low-value BHIM-UPI transactions.

Under the scheme, banks will be provided financial incentive for promoting point-of-sale (PoS) and e-commerce transactions using RuPay debit cards and low-value BHIM-UPI transactions (P2M) for current financial year FY 2022-23.

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her Budget speech for FY2022-23, announced the government’s intent to continue financial support for digital payments announced in the previous Budget, with a focus on promoting use of payment platforms.

Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) in 10 countries will now be able to do transactions through Unified Payment Interface (UPI) platform on their international numbers. 

The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has allowed UPI platforms to onboard non-resident account holders from ten countries with international mobile numbers.

In a circular issued to UPI members, NPCI said NRIs in Singapore, Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Oman, Qatar, USA, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and the UK will be allowed to use UPI platforms. NRIs must have non-resident external (NRE) and non-resident ordinary (NRO) accounts to access UPI transactions with their international mobile numbers. As per the circular, member banks will need to ensure the UPI account is only allowed as “per the extant FEMA regulations and RBI rules”. 

Gross direct tax collections up to January 10, 2023, rose 24.6% year-on-year to Rs 14.71 lakh crore, per data from the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT).

Net direct tax collectionstands at `12.31 lakh crore, which is 19.55% higher than the net collections for the corresponding period of last year. This collection is 86.68% of the Rs 14.2 lakh crore Budget estimates of direct taxes for FY23.

Indian economy's growth is projected to slow to 6.9 per cent in FY23, 0.6 percentage points lower than what had been estimated in June, the World Bank said Jan 11 in its recent report.

The slowdown in the global economy and rising uncertainty will weigh on export and investment growth. However, it highlighted that India will remain the fastest-growing economy of the seven largest EMDEs.

Meanwhile, the World Bank further added that the GDP growth will slow to 6.6 per cent in FY24 before falling back toward its potential rate of just above 6 per cent.

Edtech company upGrad’s CEO Arjun Mohan has quit the company. His decision comes at a time when edtech platforms are reeling under pressure to turn profitable. With slowing funding rounds and to conserve cash, many edtech start-ups have sacked employees in recent times.

Last month, upGrad, which employs over 7,500 people, invested Rs 30 crore to set up TuringMinds to develop tech products. 

Payment solutions provider Hitachi Payment Services and BharatPe Group on Jan 10 announced that they have received in-principle authorisation from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to operate as a payment aggregator (PA).

BharatPe said the in-principle approval has been awarded to Resilient Payments Private Limited, a 100% owned subsidiary of Resilient Innovations Private Limited (BharatPe).