Henley Passport Index, which ranks world’s passports according to the number of destinations their holder can access without a prior visa, has ranked India 87th globally out of 199 passports.

The index is based on exclusive data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA) and is corroborated by a research team Henley and Partners.

Japan, Singapore and South Korea have topped the Index. The Asian giants’ top ranking reverses pre-pandemic rankings dominated by European nations.

China is placed 69th with access to 80 countries whereas India is 87th. Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan are at the bottom of the ladder. Afghanistan’s passport offers hassle-free access to only 27 countries.

Top 10

Japan (193)

Singapore, South Korea (192)

Germany, Spain (190)

Finland, Italy, Luxembourg (189)

Austria, Denmark, Netherlands, Sweden (188)

France, Ireland, Portugal, United Kingdom (187)

Belgium, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, United States (186)

Australia, Canada, Czech Republic, Greece, Malta (185)

Hungary (183)

Gujarat Police on  july 20  arrested filmmaker Avinash Das in a case related to sharing on Twitter a photo of Union Home Minister Amit Shah with arrested IAS officer Pooja Singhal.

The Ahmedabad crime branch, which arrested him from Mumbai, was also looking into another tweet of his which appeared to hurt the sentiments of the Hindus, and going through his older social media posts.

As per the crime branch, Das intentionally gave a misleading caption to Shah's photo in question.

Das, director of the Swara Bhaskar-starrer "Anaarkali of Aarah", was picked up from his Mumbai residence by a crime branch team on july 19 .

Over Rs 980 crore has been spent by the UIDAI in the last three years on Aadhaar enrolments and updates, while nearly 5.99 lakh Aadhaars have been cancelled for being duplicate and for other reasons as of May 31, 2022.

As per government data, expenditure of Rs 141.60 crore, Rs 320 crore and Rs 519.9 crore were incurred in Aadhaar enrolments and updates in 2019-20, 2020-21 and 2021-22, respectively.

Officials claimed that the UIDAI has taken adequate steps to address duplicate or multiple Aadhaar generation issues and regular efforts are made to upgrade systems and procedures. The demographic matching mechanism has been further strengthened, biometric matching of all new enrolments is ensured and 'Face' has been included as a new modality (in addition to fingerprint and iris) for de-duplication.

Moreover, the UIDAI, through its registrars, ensures provision for Aadhaar enrollment and updates to residents. As on June 30, more than 57,000 Aadhaar centres are active across the country, while around 34,500 tablet and mobile-based machines are also functional in the field which is used for updating mobile number or email id in Aadhaar and to provide facility for Aadhaar enrolment for children under the age group of 0-5.

The European Union imposed more sanctions on Russia on  july 21  over the war in Ukraine after the bloc's member states backed a series of measures that would include gold imports and tighten export controls on some high-technology goods. 

European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said that the "reinforced, prolonged EU sanctions against the Kremlin" send "a strong signal to Moscow: we will keep the pressure high for as long as it takes." The details of the sanctions were still unclear since they still need to be posted in the EU's official journal.

EU officials have been seeking all week to tighten the extensive package of sanctions on Russia and looking at ways to add a ban on gold exports in hopes that the measures might finally start to have a decisive impact on the war in Ukraine.

EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell said  that at the moment "the most important thing is a ban on Russian gold," which is Moscow's second-largest export industry after energy.

The Group of Seven leading industrial nations last month already committed to a gold ban, arguing the Russia has used its gold to back up its currency to circumvent the impact of several rounds of sanctions that nations around the world had already imposed on Moscow for its Feb.24 invasion of Ukraine.

Italian Premier Mario Draghi resigned  on july 21 after key coalition allies boycotted a confidence vote, signaling the likelihood of an early election and a renewed period of uncertainty for Italy and Europe at a critical time.

Draghi tendered his resignation to President Sergio Mattarella during a morning meeting at the Quirinale Palace.

Mattarella, who had rejected a similar resignation offer last week, "took note" this time around and asked Draghi's government to remain on in a caretaker fashion, the president's office said.

Draghi's government of national unity imploded  july 20 after members of his uneasy coalition of right, left and populists rebuffed his appeal to band back together to finish the legislature's natural term and ensure implementation of the European Union-funded pandemic recovery program.

Vehicle recalls in India rose to a three-year high in 2021-22, with more than 13 lakh two-wheelers and passenger cars recalled over safety issues, Parliament was informed on july 21.

In a written reply to the Lok Sabha, Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari cited data maintained by the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) and said 8,64,557 two-wheelers and 4,67,311 passenger cars were recalled in 2021-22 in the country due to safety defects.

He informed the House that 1,60,025 two-wheelers and 25,142 passenger cars were recalled till July 15 of the current financial year. While more than 3.39 lakh vehicles (two-wheelers and passenger cars) were recalled in 2020-21, the number of vehicles recalled in 2019-20 stood at 2.14 lakh, he said.

Gadkari further said the total number of road accidents involving cars, taxis, vans and light motor vehicles (LMV) in the calendar year 2020 was 60,986.

The minister pointed out that Section 110 A of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 is related to the recall of motor vehicles.

Replying to a separate question, Gadkari said a total of 47,984 people died due to accidents on national highways in 2020, while 33,148 died due to accidents on state highways.

Asian Development Bank (ADB) has lowered the economic growth forecast for India for the current fiscal year to 7.2 per cent, with the impacts of COVID-19 and the Russia-Ukraine war getting exacerbated by high inflation.

In April, the multilateral funding agency had forecast the Indian economy to grow by 7.5 per cent.

It also revised downwards the economic growth in the fiscal ended March 2022 to 8.7 per cent from 8.9 per cent estimated earlier.

Forbes India and INCA, GroupM's content marketing arm announce their first-ever list of India's Top 100 Digital Stars. Content creators across nine categories--comedy, beauty, fashion, business and finance, fitness, food, tech, travel and social work--have been recognised for their innovative and engaging content.

Nikhil Sharma, popularly known as "Mumbiker Nikhil" tops the list followed by Abhishek Upmanyu and Komal Pandey. In terms of engagement, Natasha Noel is on top, whereas Ashish Chanchlani has the highest followers.