The World Health Organisation (WHO) has prequalified the first conjugate vaccine for typhoid, Bharat Biotech’s Typbar-TCV. Bharat Biotech is an Indian pharmaceutical company.

Typhoid conjugate vaccines (TCVs) are innovative products that have longer-lasting immunity than older vaccines, require fewer doses, and can be given to young children through routine childhood immunization programs. In simple terms, prequalification by WHO means that it meets acceptable standards of quality, safety and efficacy. This makes the vaccine eligible for procurement by UN agencies, such as UNICEF, and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

In October 2017, the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) on immunization, which advises WHO, recommended TCV for routine use in children over 6 months of age in typhoid endemic countries. SAGE also called for the introduction of TCV to be prioritized for countries with the highest burden of typhoid disease or of antibiotic resistance to Salmonella Typhi, the bacterium that causes the disease. Use of the vaccine should also help to curb the frequent use of antibiotics for treatment of presumed typhoid fever, and thereby help to slow the alarming increase in antibiotic resistance in Salmonella Typhi.

Shortly after SAGE’s recommendation, Gavi Board approved US$ 85 million in funding for TCVs starting in 2019. Prequalification is, therefore, a crucial next step needed to make TCVs available to low-income countries where they are needed most. And even in non-Gavi-supported countries, prequalification can help expedite licensure.

WHO prequalification helps to ensure that vaccines used in immunization programmes are safe, effective, and appropriate for countries’ needs.  WHO’s prequalification procedure consists of a transparent, scientifically sound assessment that includes reviewing the evidence, testing the consistency of each lot of manufactured vaccine, and visiting the manufacturing site.

Typhoid is a serious and sometimes fatal disease spread through contaminated food and water. Symptoms include fever, fatigue, headache, abdominal pain, and diarrhea or constipation. For millions of people living in low- and middle-income countries, typhoid is an ever present reality. Global estimates of the typhoid burden range between 11 and 20 million cases and between about 128 000 and 161 000 typhoid deaths annually. Poor communities and vulnerable groups, such as children, are often the most susceptible.

Urbanization and climate change have the potential to increase the global burden of typhoid. In addition, increasing resistance to antibiotic treatment is making it easier for typhoid to spread through overcrowded populations in cities and inadequate and/or flooded water and sanitation systems.

RANCHI : A Special CBI court on Saturday awarded three and a half years of imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs five lakh on former Bihar Chief Minister and RJD chief Lalu Prasad in a case related to the fraudulent withdrawal of Rs 89.4 crore from the Deoghar treasury.

The court of special CBI judge Shivpal Singh announced the punishment to Mr Yadav under Sections 120B (criminal conspiracy) 420 (cheating, dishonestly), 467 (forgery), 471 (forged record) and 477 (A) (falsification) of the Indian Penal Code. 

The court imposed a fine of Rs 5 lakh under Sections 13 (2) (prevention of corruption) read with Sec 13 (1) (c) (d).

In Patna, Lalu’s son Tejashwi Yadav held a meet with RJD party leaders and said, “The judiciary has performed its duty. We will go to the High Court after studying the sentence and apply for a bail”. Lalu who is currently lodged in Ranchi’s Birsa Munda Jail, received his sentence through video-conferencing.

Former Bihar Chief Minister and RJD supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav was convicted by a special CBI court in the 1996 fodder scam.  After 20 years of investigation, the CBI court in Ranchi has found Lalu Yadav guilty of fraudulent withdrawal of public money worth 89.27 lakh from Deoghar Treasury (then in Bihar, now in Jharkhand), between the years 1991 to 1994. The quantum of sentence will be pronounced on 3rd January.

He was earlier convicted and sentenced to five years jail in the first fodder scam case of swindling money through fake receipts and vouchers of 37.50 crores from Chaibasa Treasury in 2013, which technically barred him from contesting elections for next 11 years, in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to disqualify convicts jailed for more than two years.

Apart from the chief accused Lalu, the CBI special court also convicted 15 others in the fodder scam. It includes politicians like Jagdish Sharma and RK Rana, IAS officers Beck Julius, Phoolchand Singh and Mahesh Prasad, and other government officials Krishna Kumar and Subir Bhattacharya.

However, the special CBI judge Shivpal Singh acquitted the three-time former Congress CM of Bihar Jagannath Mishra and five other accused in the same case. After the conviction, Lalu Yadav and the other convicts were taken to Ranchi’s Birsa Munda Jail.

In the wake of Jagannath Mishra acquittal, RJD senior leader Raghuvansh Prasad, who was present in the court premises said, “Jagannath Mishra ko bail aur Lalu ko jail…ab yahi hai khel..(bail for Mishra and jail for Lalu, this is the game now.) When both are facing the same charges in the same case, how can one get bail and the other be jailed?”

NEW DELHI:  Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the first PIO Parliamentarian Conference on January 9 on Pravasi Bhartiya Diwas.

As many as 124 MPs, 17 Mayors of Indian origin from 23 countries, including UK, USA, South Africa and Canada will participate in the conference being held in the Capital.

“We are not sending invitation for Pravasi Bharatiya Divas to any SAARC country except Sri Lanka,’’ Dnyaneshwar Mulay, Secretary, Overseas Indian Affairs in the Ministry of External Affairs said here on Friday.  Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu will chair the valedictory session of the conference.

He said the first PIO Parliamentarian conference would open new communication channels with 23 countries and expand cooperation in a number of areas as well as create awareness on the wide spread of India’s roots. He said that nearly 270 PIOs were occupying high posts of heads of States, governments, MPs and Mayors in different countries.

At two sessions of the conference, star speakers will include former Union Minister and chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee Shashi Tharoor and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar.  

Responding to a query, Mr. Mulay said that strong links with PIOs and effective communication with them had helped in improving the image of India in a number of developed nations.

Opinion | Despite of global slowdown and tumultuous happenings around the world India has become a bright spot for information technology sourcing, and this makes a perfect business sense for Fortune 500 clients around the world to rely upon India’s IT prowess

While the major economies of the world are stung by economic slowdown, India is poised for a higher growth trajectory. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) while retains India’s overall GDP growth projection of 7.2% for 2017- 18, it marks subdued GDP growth for China, US, and EU with 6.6%, 2.3% and 1.7% respectively. The IMF further buttresses the fact that India’s economy has grown at a fast pace because of implementation of critical structural reforms, favorable trade policies and lower external vulnerabilities.

Fundamentally, when global IT-BPM spend hovers around USD 1.2 trillion and global sourcing racks at USD 173-178 billion, India’s IT-BPM exports stand high at USD 117 billion – a whopping 65% of the global outsource. With USD 154 billion revenue, IT-BPM industry in India is poised to grow at 8%. The industry comprising 16,000-plus firms is estimated to employ over 3.9 million professionals directly and over 10 million people indirectly. With 5200-plus startups, India ranks third in the global startup ecosystem. India’s software product revenue stands at USD 7 billion in FY2017, with 9.5% YoY growth rate. 

Indian domestic market witnessed higher growth for software products consumption driven by new customers in government, SMBs and eCommerce. Apart from IT-BPM, India is striving to be the leading eCommerce market with estimated revenue of USD 33 billion in FY2017, a 19% growth from FY2016. In FY2017, 8000- plus digital firms, 2000-plus digital startups and 300,000+ employees with digital skills contributed 14% of IT-BPM revenue. Globally, the demand for digital solutions is going to be the mainstay for growth.

With tectonic evolution in SMAC (Social, Mobility, Analytics, and Cloud), Indian IT companies are rapidly scaling up their business to deliver digital solutions to global clients. Disruptive technologies, impending business exigencies, and customer demands in combination derive a rational business strategy to deliver digital solutions along with traditional IT services. According to industry estimates, the export of digital solutions which was pegged at 4% in FY2014 of the total IT-BPM exports has spiked to 14% in FY2017. The key drivers for this massive jump include increasing demand for enriching customer experience, innovation in client business models, personalized customer services and improved operational efficiency. 

The most exciting part is India’s digital economy is expected to grow exponentially to USD 1 trillion in the coming 5-7 years from the current USD 400 billion. In order to create universal digital natives in India, the Government of India has already connected 1,03,736 gram panchayats by laying 2,40,222 kilometres optical fibre under the National Optical Fibre Programme, which aims to connect all the 2.5 lakh gram panchayats by March 2019. To fuel the digital economy, the role of blockchain can be paramount. As Aadhaar card is becoming universal in India, adoption of blockchain can transform India into a true digital economy by bringing in accountability and efficiency in the system.

Let’s delve deeper into the India’s value proposition for global IT business. Within quarter of a century, Indian IT and Software industry sprinted from USD 382 million in 1992-93 to USD 154 billion in FY 2017, making India the No. 1 preferred destination for setting up technology business. This didn’t happen in silos. Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), as the nodal agency for promoting the development and export of software and software services, has played a cardinal role in transforming India into the IT hub of the world. STPI acted as a catalyst to develop a favorable ecosystem for the IT industry in India. The relentless efforts of STPI in ensuring business-friendly environment attracted global MNCs to establish their offshore development centres in metros. 

Consequently, FDI in IT industry poured in to further boost the operations of Indian IT companies and exports in this sector. STPI’s focus on startups and software products development will now fuel the growth of IT industry and will make India the most preferred country for partnering technology business with the right skill with right pricing and supportive government policies.

India is not stopping there. By 2020 the IT-BPM industry revenue would rise to USD 200-225 billion and by 2025, it would touch USD 350-400 billion. The growth of digital technology and adoption by customers would help this sector to scout for 38% of the pie by 2025. In FY2025, the ratio of digital to traditional IT solutions would be in 60:40 of total global IT-BPM revenue expanding to USD 4 trillion.

Given the mature ecosystem created by Indian IT industry in last 25 years, emphasis on innovative software products development and IP creation would further drive India’s growth in IT/ITES/ESDM sector. The increasing adoption of disruptive technologies including AI, IoT, VR, AR, Cloud, Robotics and Machine Learning by global companies for rapid automation would undoubtedly bring humongous opportunities for India to become the most preferred IT destination of the world in the coming time.

The Author is Director General, Software Technology Park of India (STPI)

New Delhi : Climate change impacts are being felt in many parts of the country, as manifested in erratic rainfall, extreme weather events and changes in cropping patterns. Adapting to these changes at farm and household levels is critical. A new study says women, particularly in marginalised communities, possess necessary knowledge to cope with climate risks.

The study assessed the role of individual women in coping with climatic risks, particularly in managing agriculture, energy and nutrition in flood and drought-prone paddy growing region of eastern India. It was found that women’s participation and involvement is much higher in managing nursery as well as in other farm-related functions like transplanting and weeding. Women resort to exchange of knowledge and resources at their level to face exigencies of climatic variation, given the absence of timely governmental interventions.

For instance, women use creative ways to manage food and nutrition security in their households in lean months. Many of them plant cucurbits like bottle gourd, pumpkin, satputia (a small cultivar of ridge gourd) and okra in their homesteads, catering to vegetable needs of the family since these are costlier in summer. A few women ensured food security by processing fruits and vegetables and storing them for consumption later. They harvest weeds and segregate them for consumption by human and some for cattle, while non-edible ones are composted. 

Women in high-risk zones, especially arid and semi-arid zones choose leaves and stem of many plants available throughout the year for food. “This becomes an important coping strategy to fight food shortage or famine. Many of these plants have been used in traditional medicine systems for their therapeutic effects,” the study says. Researchers have documented such weeds used in three villages in the study area. Their expertise and knowledge about non-agricultural food sources help in dealing with food and nutrition availability resulting due to fluctuating climate, the study says.

“In a situation when not many technological alternatives are available and climate risks have to be coped with, there are ways in which individual women find creative ways by managing resource exchange and pooling, overcoming class and cultural boundaries,” explained Dr Anil Gupta of Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, who conducted the study along with Anamika Dey and Gurdeep Singh of Indian Institute of Technology, Dhanbad.  

The research is part of a long-term study on loss of agrobiodiversity underway in three villages (Isoulibhari, Shivnathpur, and Kharella) in Faizabad district in eastern Uttar Pradesh. The villages, located in floodplains of the Sarayu river, are flood prone and mostly follow rain-fed rice-wheat cropping system. The region is facing vagaries of climate change. Data of the past 25 years obtained from Narendra Deva University of Agriculture and Technology showed high fluctuation in onset and withdrawal of monsoon, number of rainfall days, total rainfall received and average rainfall received per number of days. 

“We found that knowledge networks of women contribute immensely to tide over the adverse effect of the risk episodes. But these informal channels of dissemination of the knowledge are often not recorded in formal scientific discourses,” Dr Gupta told India Science Wire. 

Instead of ignoring the role of such informal networks, they can be used as channels for targeting climate adaptation policies and programmes, the study has suggested. If women groups become focal points of knowledge and resource dissemination in situations like crop failure due to flood or drought, there are fair chances that they will share these more openly. In addition, weather information needs to be provided according to local calendars, which are different from the Gregorian calendars, the study has suggested. The study has been published in journal World Development.

New Delhi: In a major development, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman gave a go ahead for two procurement proposals. 

The first proposal is related to procurement of 240 bombs at a cost of Rs 1254 crore from M/s JSC Rosonboron Exports, Russia. These bombs, which fall under the category of Precision Guided Munitions (PGMs), are used by Indian Air Force (IAF). 

With this, the Indian Air Force (IAF) will be able to cope up the deficiency of PGMs in its arsenal, besides enhancing the offensive capabilities.

Another defence proposal, which got clearance, was pertained to procurement of 131 Barak Missiles and associated equipment at a cost of Rs 460 cr under option clause from M/s Rafael Advance Defence Systems Ltd of Israel. 

These missiles are surface-to-air missiles designed to be used as a ship-borne anti-missile defence system against anti-ship missiles.

It may be noted here that the Defence Minister and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin in New Delhi recently held wide-ranging talks with a focus on further boosting the bilateral defence and security ties through joint manufacture and co-development of key military platforms and weapon systems.

The Government has given the go ahead for procurement of 131 Barak missile, which is apart from the deal India was having with Israel’s Rafael Advance Defence for procurement of  Spike Anti Tank Guided Missile at a cost of $500 million and scrapped in November 2017. 

Scrapping the project, the Government asked the DRDO to produce the missiles indigenously. 

With the stage set for the annual Budget on Thursday, India a scored 48—slightly higher than the global average– on a global survey on budget transparency. The global average score for budget transparency is 43 on a scale of 0-100.

The Open Budget Survey (OBS) 2017 been carried out by the International Budget Partnership (IBP) covering 115 countries, and is based on an internationally comparable methodology using 109 equally weighted indicators to measure budget transparency on a scale of 0-100.

The survey, for each country, evaluates eight key budget documents of the national/ Union / Central Government and assesses whether these documents are made public (available online) in a timely manner providing comprehensive information. These eight key budget documents are:  Pre-Budget Statement; Executive’s Budget Proposal; Enacted Budget; Citizens Budget; In-Year Reports; Mid-Year Review; Year-End Report and Audit Report. The survey was carried out between September and December 2016, thus covering the developments up to 31 December 2016, in the financial year 2016-17.

The Survey highlights that the global average score of budget transparency has declined by 2 percentage points from 45 in 2015 to 43 in 2017. There are only 28 countries that provide ‘sufficient budget information’ at the level of the national budget, (scoring above 61 points in the scale of 0-100). Countries such as New Zealand and South Africa (89 each) top the charts whereas Qatar and Yemen score a zero indicating no budget information being available in public domain. The average score for South Asian countries (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) registered an increase of 5 percentage points during the period to reach 46. India’s overall score is 48, an improvement of 2 percentage points from a score of 46 in 2015.

In terms of publishing timely and relevant information in Audit Reports and In-Year Reports, India has scored well above other countries. Not publishing Pre-Budget Statement and Mid-Year Review in 2016 lowered the country’s score. However, had the OBS been carried out for financial year 2017-18, India’s score would have been higher; as the advancing of presentation of Union Budget by a month last year made the earlier practice of Vote on Account redundant and the full Budget gets enacted before the start of the new financial year.

But a critical indicator for enhancing budget transparency is the scope available for public participation in budgetary processes; and, India has scored only 15 out of 100 in public participation, which is better than the global average of 12 but still very low with regard to the role of legislatures and that of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) in terms of the oversight on budgets, India’s score is 48 out of 100. As the functioning of these oversight institutions is very crucial in the budget accountability ecosystem, there is a need for stepping-up efforts in this domain.

Subrat Das, Executive Director of CBGA, observed that, “OBS is a good indicator of budget transparency at the Union level, but it is limited in scope as it does not capture the issues of transparency at the sub-national level, particularly at the district level”. He also added that “a number of steps initiated at the Union level during the last seven to eight years, such as publishing all budget documents in machine readable format, improved accessibility of the expenditure budget document and central share of funds in all Centrally Sponsored Schemes being routed through the State Budgets have improved budget transparency to some extent”.

Nilachala Acharya, Research Coordinator, CBGA and Researcher OBS, believes that “lack of availability of district-specific budget information is a serious challenge. Hence by making state and district treasury information publicly accessible and publishing information pertaining to fund flow and fund utilisation of development schemes at the district and sub-district level would significantly enhance budget transparency in the country.”  

New Delhi : Today Ministry of Finance has issued cautious advisory on Virtual ‘Currencies’.

“There has been a phenomenal increase in recent times in the price of Virtual ‘Currencies’ (VCs) including Bitcoin, in India and globally. The VCs don’t have any intrinsic value and are not backed by any kind of assets. The price of Bitcoin and other VCs therefore is entirely a matter of mere speculation resulting in spurt and volatility in their prices. There is a real and heightened risk of investment bubble of the type seen in ponzi schemes which can result in sudden and prolonged crash exposing investors, especially retail consumers losing their hard-earned money. Consumers need to be alert and extremely cautious as to avoid getting trapped in such Ponzi schemes. VCs are stored in digital/electronic format, making them vulnerable to hacking, loss of password, malware attack etc. which may also result in permanent loss of money. As transactions of VCs are encrypted they are also likely being used to carry out illegal/subversive activities, such as, terror-funding, smuggling, drug trafficking and other money-laundering Acts.

VCs are not backed by Government fiat. These are also not legal tender. Hence, VCs are not currencies. These are also being described as ‘Coins’. There is however no physical attribute to these coins. Therefore, Virtual ‘Currencies’ (VCs) are neither currencies nor coins. The Government or Reserve Bank of India has not authorised any VCs as a medium of exchange. Further, the Government or any other regulator in India has not given license to any agency for working as exchange or any other kind of intermediary for any VC. Persons dealing in them must consider these facts and beware of the risks involved in dealing in VCs.

The users, holders and traders of VCs have already been cautioned three times, in December, 2013, February, 2017 and December, 2017, by Reserve Bank of India about the potential financial, operational, legal, customer protection and security related risks that they are exposing themselves to by investing in Bitcoin and/ or other VCs. RBI has also clarified that it has not given any licence/ authorization to any entity/ company to operate such schemes or deal with Bitcoin or any virtual currency. The Government also makes it clear that VCs are not legal tender and such VCs do not have any regulatory permission or protection in India. The investors and other participants therefore deal with these VCs entirely at their risk and should best avoid participating therein.”

ROORKEE : Professor Pranita P Sarangi of the Department of Biotechnology, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee has been awarded Innovative Young Biotechnologist Award 2017 (IYBA-2017) by the government.

The Award is given by the Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science and Technology and carries a research grant up to Rs. 50 lakh and a cash award prize of Rs. 1 lakh per year during the project period. Prof. Pranita was chosen based on her scientific achievements and the proposed work in the field of cancer immunology.

Talking about the achievement, Prof. Pranita said,” This is a highly prestigious scheme from the Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science and Technology, to identify and nurture outstanding young scientists with innovative ideas to pursue research in frontier areas of biotechnology “

Explaining about her work, Prof. Pranita said, “Cancer is the second largest cause of death worldwide including India, after heart diseases. Current therapeutic approaches available for treating cancers are primarily based on chemotherapies, which are highly toxic, and recurrence of tumors requires higher doses of such reagents leading to severe toxic side effects. The host immune system plays a crucial role in protecting our body from the development of cancers but in a cancer patient, with progression of time, the anti-cancer immunity is gradually reduced and become non-functional. Scientists have shown that cancer cells adopt various mechanisms to make our immune cells non-functional.”

“The proposed work will discover new molecular interactions in a cancer environment that re-educate our immune cells not to fight against the cancerous cells. Thus, this will help in the development of novel targeted therapeutics that could further help in managing cancer patients by restoring the functions of the immune cells,’’ she added.

Prof. Pranita has completed her PhD from College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Tennessee, USA. She is also working as Special Research Volunteer, Laboratory of Cell and Developmental Biology, Molecular Biology Section, NIDCR/National Institute of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA since 2013. Her work has won her AAI Early Career Faculty Travel Grant Award, Immunology-2017, Washington DC, USA.

New Delhi : The Advocating Reproductive Choices (ARC) coalition has welcomed the opinion expressed by some parliamentarians on the need to revise the National Population Policy of 2000. This opinion was expressed by some members in the Lok Sabha in the ongoing session.

The ARC coalition calls on the government to consider the long term impact of such restrictive policies that evidently result in skewed demographics and gender imbalance, and negate the rights-based approach. What is required is a national population policy that recognises the dignity and rights of women and men, and equips them to make an informed choice for a healthy and planned family.

“We do agree that there is an urgent need to define India’s approach towards population stabilisation in line with India’s commitments on the global 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the actions required to meet its stated objectives on family planning,’’  a statement issued by ARC has said.

However, the call for introducing a policy with a two child norm in anticipation of a “demographic catastrophe” is not appropriate given the fact that in the last decade (2005-06 – 2015-16), India’s total fertility rate (TFR) has gone down from 2.7 to 2.2, which is very close to the desired replacement level fertility at 2.1. In the past, in states such as Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh where the law had debarred women with more than two children from benefits, there was a rise in sex-selective abortions, incidents of women being deserted, or giving their children up for adoption. With a skewed child sex ratio (0-6 years) of 919 girls to a 1000 boys, India can ill afford a restrictive two-child norm that would further discriminate against the girl child, the statement said.

In fact, institutionalising such a policy will undo decades of efforts undertaken to establish a rights based approach to family planning, which was adopted as part of India’s commitment at the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo in 1994. The proposed approach will not only tilt towards a coercive and target-driven policy, but will also impinge on individual freedom and imply it is not the people but the numbers that matter. Pushing for an ‘anti-natalist’ policy resting on coercion and disincentives is an unacceptable direction and has proven to be counterproductive on innumerable instances. The forced sterilisations of 1975 pushed back India’s family planning programme by decades and was a leading argument against authoritarianism that unseated the party in power of that time, the ARC said.

At this moment there is need to reflect on how states such as Kerala, with a TFR of 1.6, reduced its fertility rates by investing in long-term measures like educating and empowering girls and women by ensuring equal rights, and improving health care delivery. Our neighbours, too, have good lessons to offer. Sri Lanka lowered its fertility rates by increasing the age at marriage, while Bangladesh succeeded by mobilising a cadre of village-level health workers to build awareness and acceptability of family planning.

Data from the National Family Health Survey – 3 shows that the sex ratio of the next birth gets even worse for women with four or more living children and one son (541 girls per 1,000 boys).

Advocating Reproductive Choices (ARC) is a coalition of more than 170 civil society organisations and individuals that are committed to advocating for greater attention and focus on sexual and reproductive health issues and family planning services in India. Established in 2005, the Coalition aims to expand contraceptive choices and calls for greater attention to the quality of care of family planning services for the Indian population.