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The Morning Wrap: Censor Board Stuffed With RSS Honchos, TCS Most Profitable Indian Company

The Morning Wrap: Censor Board Stuffed With RSS Honchos, TCS Most Profitable Indian Company
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (TCS) Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director S. Ramadorai, fifth from left, poses with the members of TCS Financial Solutions team after a press conference in Bangalore, India, Monday, Aug. 6, 2007. TCS, India's top software company, said Monday it has a pipeline of 150 orders ranging from USD 5 million to USD 200 million in the financial services, banking and insurance solutions over the next 12 to 18 months. TCS Financial Solution senior officials President N.G. Subramaniam, fifth from right, Head of Global Sales Robert U. Mullen, second right, and Chief Marketing Officer Dennis Roman, third right, are also seen. (AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi)
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (TCS) Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director S. Ramadorai, fifth from left, poses with the members of TCS Financial Solutions team after a press conference in Bangalore, India, Monday, Aug. 6, 2007. TCS, India's top software company, said Monday it has a pipeline of 150 orders ranging from USD 5 million to USD 200 million in the financial services, banking and insurance solutions over the next 12 to 18 months. TCS Financial Solution senior officials President N.G. Subramaniam, fifth from right, Head of Global Sales Robert U. Mullen, second right, and Chief Marketing Officer Dennis Roman, third right, are also seen. (AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi)

The Morning Wrap is Huffpost India's selection of interesting news and opinion from the day's newspapers.

Main News

The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government on Monday re-constituted the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC), drawing nearly half the new team from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and its ideological parent, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). The government appointed Hindi film producer Pahlaj Nihalani, who created the "Har ghar Modi" video nine months ago, as chairperson of the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) for a period of three years.

Trinamool MP and former railway minister, Dinesh Trivedi, who once went against his party's line on the rail budget to support Manmohan Singh, is now rooting for Narendra Modi. He was recorded effusively praising PM Modi at a function in Kutch, Gujarat. "We need to accept the fact that people's feelings, support and aspirations are with Narendra Modi at this point of time."

The Telegraph reports that the IITs and other centrally-funded higher education institutions face a threat to their autonomy with the government moving to ask them to seek its guidance before entering into any academic collaboration with foreign universities. This comes after a still-unresolved fracas concerning IIT Delhi and the education ministry.

Indian security forces have deployed around 1,200 more troops on stretches along the India-Pakistan border after intelligence inputs indicated heightened risks of cross-border infiltration in the run-up to US President Barack Obama's Republic Day visit.

After 23 years, India has a new leader when it comes to net profit. Information technology major Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) posted a net profit of Rs 5,328 crore for the quarter ended December, overtaking long-standing champion Reliance Industries Ltd. Though these figures are only for one quarter, it is still a significant moment in Indian business history as it's the first time an IT company has topped the profit charts. Reliance itself had overtaken the previous leader, Tata Steel, on the back of India's economic reforms.

Having signed nine ordinances since the NDA government assumed office eight months ago, President Pranab Mukherjee on Monday cautioned that the ordinance route should be taken only in "compelling circumstances."

In a clear message to discipline party leaders, the BJP on Monday declared India's first woman IPS officer Kiran Bedi as its chief ministerial candidate in Delhi and made her in charge of the campaign committee.

Former Union Minister and Congress MP Shashi Tharoor was on Monday night questioned by the Delhi Police in connection with his wife Sunanda Pushkar's death. The questioning came nearly three weeks after a case of murder was registered on the basis of a medical report which concluded that she died due to poisoning.

Speaking to The Indian Express, Dilantha Withanage, chief executive of the Bodu Bala Sena (BBS), a hardline Sinhalese Buddhist nationalist organisation said that his group is inspired by the BJP and RSS and that it would soon launch "a party modelled on these Indian ventures to protect Buddhist culture in Sri Lanka."

China on Monday lodged protests with Tokyo after Japanese foreign minister Fumio Kishida was quoted as saying that Arunachal Pradesh was part of India during his visit to New Delhi over the weekend. China claims Arunachal Pradesh for itself as 'South Tibet,' and is part of the decades-long Sino-India border dispute which triggered a brief but brutal war in 1962.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has identified labour reform as the pivot to enhance the skills of India's labour force, boost manufacturing and create jobs in the country. Accordingly, the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) has despatched a letter to chief secretaries of all states to adopt the example of Rajasthan and push for labour reforms.

Fields medallist Manjul Bhargava will be the face and facilitator of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pet education project to rope in eminent scholars and scientists abroad to teach students at IITs and central universities.

Off The Front Page

Reflecting the global popularity of Indian food, a number of Indian words like 'keema' and 'papad' have been accepted in the Oxford English dictionary for the first time ever. Over the years, around 900-1000 Indian words have found its place in the Oxford dictionary.

Two BJP leaders in West Bengal's West Midnapore district and 27 other party activists were arrested for illegally possessing arms and ammunition and planning a dacoity, the police said on Monday.

The Aam Aadmi Party's leaders are now worried about physical threats from their own former colleagues. Senior AAP leader Ashutosh was heckled by supporters of MLA Rajesh Garg, a former AAP leader, and they reportedly kept Ashutosh hostage for over an hour. He finally had to jump a wall to escape the commotion.

Bloomberg reports that Air India is hedging large quantities of jet fuel for the the first time, as the state-run carrier seeks to take advantage of lower crude oil prices, a person with direct knowledge of the matter said. Cheaper oil prices could help Air India save $324 million for the year ending March 31, 2016, and help it break even before its target of turning a profit by 2019.

Two senior leaders in the Congress-led UDF Government in Kerala were caught conspiring to incriminate their colleague and state finance minister, KM Mani, in a bribery case.

Opinion

Ashok Desai in The Telegraph says that Modi needs to frequently consult his economists before he lays out his plans on manufacturing, and general management of the economy.

Ajai Shah in the Business Standard says that Obama's visit must be an opportunity for India "... to stop behaving like a yokel at a country fair, unable to participate for fear of being pickpocketed..."

Dev Lahiri in the Times of India says that "No amount of legislation, CCTV cameras, policemen or banning cab services is going to really change things," unless more and proper gender-sensitization processes are in place.

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This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost India, which closed in 2020. Some features are no longer enabled. If you have questions or concerns about this article, please contact indiasupport@huffpost.com.