Punjab teen, who made a world record in fitness without ever going to a gym, reveals his secret: ‘Desi ghee, butter and milk’

Kuwar Amritbir Singh set the Guinness World Record for doing most push-ups with claps (finger tips) in one minute in February.

A teenager from Punjab’s Gurdaspur district who has never been to a gym or taken protein supplements is making his mark in fitness by following his own unconventional methods of training. Kuwar Amritbir Singh is not yet 20 but has managed to create a few world records and he has no intention to stop.

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Gautam Adani now world’s 3rd richest person, overtakes Louis Vuitton chief

This is the first time an Asian person has broken into the top three of the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Business conglomerate Adani Group’s chairman Gautam Adani is now the world’s third-richest person after overtaking France’s Bernard Arnault according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

With a total net worth of USD 137.4 billion, 60-year-old Adani has surpassed the wealth of Louis Vuitton chairman Arnault and is now just behind business magnate Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos in the ranking.

In the latest Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Reliance chief Mukesh Ambani is at number 11 with a total USD 91.9 billion worth.

This is the first time an Asian person has broken into the top three of the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

The index is a daily ranking of the world’s richest people. Details about the calculations are provided in the net worth analysis on each billionaire’s profile page. The figures are updated at the close of every trading day in New York.

The net worth of Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are currently at USD 251 billion and USD 153 billion, respectively.

Adani is a first-generation entrepreneur and the Adani Group comprises of 7 publicly listed entities with businesses spanning energy, ports and logistics, mining and resources, gas, defence and aerospace and airports. In each of its business areas, the Group has established a leadership position in India.

The Adani Group is the third largest conglomerate (after Reliance Industries and the Tata Group) in India.

Listed Adani group companies are Adani Enterprises, Adani Green Energy, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone, Adani Power, Adani Total Gas, and Adani Transmission.

Over the past 5 years, flagship company Adani Enterprises has invested heavily in new growth sectors that include airports, cement, copper refining, data centres, green hydrogen, petrochemical refining, roads and solar cell manufacturing.

Looking ahead, it plans to foray into the telecom space and has massive plans to grow its green hydrogen and airports businesses.

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Unheralded Tamil short film ‘Shashthi’ wins 25 film festival awards

Featured in 59 film festivals, ‘Shasthi’, which digs into the world of a girl and her journey, has already won 25 awards.

 From a career in chartered accountancy to winning accolades in international film festivals, it may seem like a long shot. But producer and director Jude Peter Damian has done just that with ‘Shashthi’, his first short film.

Featured in 59 film festivals, ‘Shasthi’, which digs into the world of a girl and her journey, has already won 25 awards.

As a director, Jude always wanted to make movies projecting “good characters” who can be examples for developing nations and societies.

‘Shashthi’ narrates the interesting tale about Devi, a woman from an economically weaker background, who changes society to the extent that she is equated with ‘Shashthi’, the goddess of children. It is about how ordinary people (particularly women) can do ‘great’ things and about how perceptions change in different circumstances.

While talking about the recognition that the film is receiving constantly, Jude shared: “Right from the time of writing/planning of the film production, I had international film awards in my mind.”

“I’m happy about the recognition from so many international film festivals, but, honestly, I’m slightly disappointed that the film was not able to enter the Academy Awards competition. I hope I’ll be able to make a film in the near future that gets nominated for the competition sections of the Academy Awards and Cannes Festival.”

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Meet Karthik Thulasi, a 24-year-old Indian-origin footballer in La Liga

Karthik Thulasi’s love for the game brought him to play in four different countries in the span of his career. 

Karthik Thulasi still remembers knocking the football back and forth in his apartment building. The living room would become his ground, the sofa and coffee table became obstacles, and the table in the corner would become a goalpost.

The now 24-year-old football aspirant standing at the gates of La Liga laughs as he adds, “My mother smacked me on my head for breaking everything from window shields to light bulbs, and shattering even her precious porcelain.”

Born and brought up in the Sultanate of Oman, he aspired to be a professional footballer. His love for the game brought him to play in four different countries in the span of his career. Currently playing for La Liga’s Rayo Vallecano Development Squad, he began like any other football fan, but with a lot more fire!

“The game spellbinds me with the multitude of prospects that lie ahead of me – the need to thrive and achieve still burning deep,” he says.

Karthik studied at Indian School Nizwa, Oman. Besides playing for the school football team, he started his career playing with FC Nizwa, a native football club in the country. Continuing his graduation in Muscat, he was rooted in his passion for the sport and persistently played for several other clubs in Oman. Soon after graduating, he relocated to Kerala and joined training with Gokulam FC.

“I trained with Gokulam (FC) for a while and everything was going fine. I wanted a leap in my career and decided to join Universidad Europea de Madrid, well known as Real Madrid University. The decision opened the door to my all-time dream,” he says.

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India, Tanzania to set up task force to prepare five-year ‘future road map’ on defence cooperation

Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh met Tanzanian Minister of Defence and National Service Dr. Stergomena Lawrence Tax to discuss a range of issues in New Delhi

India and Tanzania agreed on the formation of a task force to prepare a five-year ‘future road map’ for enhancing defence cooperation between both the countries and to hold the next Joint Defence Cooperation meeting in Tanzania at an early date. This was agreed at the bilateral meeting between Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and the Tanzanian Minister of Defence and National Service Dr. Stergomena Lawrence Tax on Friday.

“A wide range of issues concerning bilateral, regional and defence industrial cooperation were discussed during the meeting. The two Ministers reviewed the existing military-to-military activities and discussed ways to enhance cooperation in all domains with a focus on defence industry cooperation,” a Ministry statement said.

Mr. Singh also invited his Tanzanian counterpart to the ‘India-Africa Defence Dialogue’ and DefExpo which is scheduled to be held in Gandhinagar, Gujarat between October 18 to 22.

Earlier in the day, Ms. Tax visited the National War Memorial and paid homage to the fallen soldiers and later, she was accorded a ceremonial guard of honour.

Dr. Tax would be visiting the Wargaming Development Centre and Information Fusion Centre – Indian Ocean Region before departing for Hyderabad for interaction with Indian defence industries, the statement added.

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Crowded at the top: On strong domestic base propelling Indian chess\

A strong domestic base is propelling Indian chess to great heights.


When a 17-year-old beats the five-time World champion and strongest chess player of all time in three games in a row, it is bound to attract attention. R. Praggnanandhaa did that at Miami on Sunday, the final day of the FTX Crypto Cup. His stunning victory over Magnus Carlsen, however, was not enough to win the tournament; he had to settle for the runner-up spot behind the Norwegian. But this is more than creditable, as all his seven rivals in the round-robin event had higher Fide ratings. And it was not the first time that he was beating Carlsen, having scored wins in online tournaments earlier this year. The great show at Miami should no doubt be a huge morale-booster for the Chennai lad. He had flown to Miami soon after helping India 2 win the bronze medal at the Chennai Chess Olympiad. He was not the biggest star at Mamallapuram, though. His teammate, D. Gukesh, also from Chennai and also a teenager, had created a sensation at the Olympiad, posting eight wins on the trot. A few months earlier, it was yet another Indian teenager, Arjun Erigaisi, who was hitting the headlines.

Apart from Praggnanandhaa, Gukesh and Erigaisi, two other young Indians — Nihal Sarin and Raunak Sadhwani — had also come up with excellent performances at the Olympiad. Sadhwani then won the blitz title at the Abu Dhabi International Chess Festival, a few hours before Praggnanandhaa’s victory against Carlsen. At the Masters section of the tournament, Sadhwani shared the second spot after five rounds with Erigaisi and Sarin, among others. As for Gukesh, he is busy improving his rating at the Turkish Chess Super League in Ankara. That all these hugely talented youngsters are making their Grand-masterly moves at the same time augurs well for Indian chess. And there are a few more youngsters waiting in the wings, such as V. Pranav and Bharath Subramaniyam. Rarely has India threatened to take the world on, in any sport, with a group of promising teenagers. Viswanathan Anand, the man who began it all, may have been the lone Indian at the top, but his successors are likely to have company. He is now mentoring the young Indians, who have acknowledged how much they have gained from working with him. These days, quality coaches, some of them Grandmasters, are available across the country. A strong domestic base, made possible by, among other things, parental support and the rise in the popularity of the game, promises even brighter days ahead for Indian chess.

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India to become world’s number one producer of steel: Scindia

He was of the view that India has moved from becoming the net importer of steel to the net exporter of steel.

 Union Minister Jyotiraditya M Scindia on Tuesday exuded confidence that India will become the number one producer of steel in the world in the days to come. India is the world’s second-largest producer of crude steel after China.

The minister was speaking during a conference on the Indian minerals and metals industry organised by NMDC and Ficci.

He was of the view that India has moved from becoming the net importer of steel to the net exporter of steel.

He said India’s per capita consumption of steel has increased from 57.8 kg in 2013-14 to 78 kg. The government intends to achieve 300 million tonnes (MT) of steel production target by 2030, Scindia said.

Steel across the world is the primary sector which results in economic, capital and infrastructure growth.

“Our target policy and focus also have been to turn India from just another player in the steel sector to becoming a force to reckon with,” he added.

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Jaishankar unveils bust of Mahatma Gandhi in Paraguay

The visit of the External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar is aimed at exploring new areas of cooperation in the post-pandemic era

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar has unveiled a bust of Mahatma Gandhi in Paraguay and visited the historic Casa de la Independencia from where the South American country’s Independence movement started more than two centuries ago.

Mr. Jaishankar arrived in Brazil on the first leg of his six-day visit to South America aimed at boosting overall bilateral ties with the region. Mr. Jaishankar, who is on his first-ever official visit to South America, is also visiting Paraguay and Argentina.

“Honoured to unveil a bust of Mahatma Gandhi ji in Asuncion, Paraguay. Appreciate the Asuncion Municipality’s decision to locate it at the prominent waterfront of the city. This is a statement of solidarity that was so strongly expressed during the Covid pandemic,” S. Jaishankar said in a tweet on Sunday.

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Collision impact reducer developed by woman dentist in Kerala gets U.K. patent

Device cuts severity of impact during accidents

Collision Impact Reducer, a device developed by a Thrissur-based woman dentist and intended for reducing the impact of collisions involving automobiles, has received patent granted in the United Kingdom.

The invention by Dhanya R.S. has already been granted patent in India. The device has been developed with an objective of saving lives, reducing injuries and lessening other damage during accidents.

In addition to vehicles, the device can be used on crash guards, pillars of bridges, railway lines, culverts of bridges, road medians, hand rails, ships, harbours, boats, boat jetties, seaports and on most areas with increased probability for collisions.

Dr. Dhanya says everyday reports about accidents and casualties prompted her to develop such a device. “It can be installed on the front, rear and sides of light, medium and heavy vehicles. It effectively reduces the severity of impact by absorbing the intense energy generated during collisions. The system also has technology to prevent the ‘recoil effect’ that occurs when the absorbed energy attempts to get released. Technically, it is a mechanical system, so it is more reliable and relatively inexpensive,” she says.

The dentist had applied for patent in the United States and the United Kingdom after receiving a favourable International Search Report on the application submitted to the World Intellectual Property Organisation.

Dr. Dhanya has also secured a U.S. patent grant for a technology named ‘digitalised high value paper currency’ meant for preventing counterfeiting of currency.

Hailing from Chavakkad in Thrissur, Dr. Dhanya holds an MDS in Public Health Dentistry and is a teaching faculty of Public Health Dentistry at PSM Dental College, Akkikavu, Thrissur.

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India supplies nearly 60% of vaccines used worldwide: Nirmala Sitharaman

India today is double dosing every citizen and produced COVID-19 vaccines even during the lockdown period, said Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said nearly 60% of all the vaccines used in the world are produced in India and over the decades, the country has made remarkable contribution to vaccinating the world.

India today is double dosing every citizen and produced COVID-19 vaccines even during the lockdown period, she added.

Launching the book India’s Vaccine Growth Story by Sajjan Singh Yadav, Additional Secretary, Expenditure Department, Sitharaman said it is in the country’s DNA to be able to contribute to world vaccination.

“Over the decades India has made remarkable contribution. Nearly 60% of all the vaccines which are used in the world are produced in India. India has singular contribution to make to the world in terms of vaccination and that which is being produced and supplied to the entire world,” Ms. Sitharaman said.

Today, the country is double dosing every citizen, she said, adding it is not easy to produce and execute COVID vaccination at that scale.

India crossed the target of 200 crore COVID vaccinations in a time-bound manner. So far, 208.57 crore doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered under the nationwide inoculation drive.

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