Congress leader Jaiveer Shergill on  Aug 24 quit as its national spokesperson, saying the party's decision-making process is no longer in the interest of the country but is influenced by "self-serving interests of individuals indulging in sycophancy"

As United Kingdom (UK) braces to choose a new Prime Minister and also finalise the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with India, a 1992-batch diplomat, Vikram Doraiswami, has been announced as India’s Ambassador to the UK.

He has also served in the Prime Minister’s Office. He has worked with both Late Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee as his Private Secretary and also with Former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh.

He will assume charge in London shortly, says the Ministry of External Affairs. The last Ambassador of UK , Gaitri Issar Kumar, retired from service on June 30th so this appointment was much awaited.

Doraiswami has been serving as the Ambassador of Bangladesh since October 2020. With the fifth round of the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between India and UK over, the trade talks will gather momemtum to meet the Diwali deadline. This was a much-awaited announcement.

The cash-strapped Sri Lankan government has slapped a ban on the import of 300 consumer items like chocolates, perfumes and shampoos until further notice, as the island nation tried to tackle its worst economic crisis triggered by the acute shortage of foreign exchange.

Sri Lanka is going through its worst economic crisis since its independence in 1948. The worsening forex crisis caused essential items shortages triggering massive public protests in the street since early this year that led to the ouster of the Gotabaya Rajapaksa government last month.

In a special notification issued by the Sri Lankan finance ministry, the ban was imposed on a total of 300 items including chocolates, perfumes, wristwatches, telephones, pressure cookers, air conditioners, musical instruments, alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages among several other products.

President Ranil Wickremesinghe, in his capacity as the Finance, Economic Stabilisation and National Policies Minister, issued new regulations via an extraordinary gazette suspending the import of a plethora of items, with effect from August 23, 2022, until further notice.

However, these items if shipped before August 23 and arrive in the country before September 14 would still be allowed, it stated.

Cryptos are a solution to multiple financial problems, say crypto players, as RBI governor Shaktikanta Das told a news channel that since all the cryptos are denominated in hard currencies, by and large, dollar, it will not work in favour of countries like India. He also said that it may be misused as a tool for money laundering.

Crypto players say the comments from the RBI’s governor are not new.

Last month, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the RBI has asked the government to frame regulations for cryptocurrencies, considering their destabilising effect of them on the monetary and fiscal stability of a country.
Apart from global factors, the Indian crypto industry also started seeing layoffs, crypto winter and the new TDS rule bringing down volumes on crypto exchanges.

Currently, there are about 35 million crypto users in India

India's merchandise exports are likely to be around USD 470-480 billion in the current fiscal against USD 420 billion in 2021-22, Commerce Secretary BVR Subrahmanyam said

The secretary also said the trade deficit, which crossed USD 100 billion in the first four months of the current fiscal, will not cross the "discomfort level".

Talking to reporters, Subrahmanyam said the merchandise trade during 2022-23 will be USD 470-480 billion and the services sector is likely to contribute another 280 billion.

India's overall exports (merchandise and services) touched an all-time high of USD 669.65 billion in April-March 2021-22, jumping by 34.50 per cent over the same period last year.

On trade deficit, the secretary said it is likely to moderate in the coming months because softening of prices of oil and other commodities in the global market.

The merchandise trade deficit in July 2022 was USD 31.02 billion, taking the gap between imports and exports to USD 100.01 billion in April-July 2022-23.

Meanwhile, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal released a dossier on the restructuring of the Department of Commerce with a view to making it 'future ready' and put in place an ecosystem to achieve the USD 2 trillion export target by 2030.

Legendary Australian all-rounder Shane Watson revealed his top five players that he would select as a part of a World T20 eleven, which features star Indian batter Suryakumar Yadav.

Watson represented Australia from 2002-16 and went out of the national side as one of its greatest white-ball players. In recent times, he has taken a coaching role to nurture new talent, joining Delhi Capitals as their assistant coach in the Indian Premier League.

During his years in coaching, Watson is keeping a close eye on some of the best T20I talents all over the world and eagerly waits for ICC T20 World Cup, which will take place from October-November this year.

First one I would pick would be Babar Azam

Second one is Suryakumar Yadav.

Explosive England opener Jos Buttler is Watson's fourth pick

India's Anupama Ramachandran and Keerthana Pandian won the silver and bronze medals respectively in the U-21 Women's event at the IBSF World Junior Snooker Championships in Bucharest, Romania.

Ramachandran lost to Thailand's Panchaya Channoi 1-4 in the summit clash on Aug 23.

England Football announced that star midfielder Jill Scott will retire from football after representing the country in 161 matches.

Scott retires on a positive note after clinching the Women's Euro 2022 title as the second-highest capped English women's footballer, with only Fara Williams, her former teammate, ahead of her.