Golden feet — 2018 FIFA World Cup

The 2018 FIFA World Cup begins in Russia in a flurry of excitement. That there is no single, overwhelming favourite to win the trophy has only added to the appeal of what is cracked up as the world’s biggest sporting event. Brazil, the most successful World Cup team of all time, appears revived after a humiliating semifinal loss on home soil four years ago. Tite, the manager, has made the world fall in love with the Selecao again, shunning the dull style of his predecessor Dunga and helping produce some captivating football. Germany, the reigning champion and the side that inflicted a 7-1 defeat on Brazil in Belo Horizonte, has looked far from its best in its last few friendly matches. But this is a world-class side with gifted, young players and is supremely organised. Spain, revitalised after two poor tournaments, sacked its manager Julen Lopetegui for signing on as manager of club powerhouse Real Madrid. With a squad featuring several Madrid and Barcelona players, the decision was made to retain team cohesion, which helped it sail through the qualifiers. France comes with a roster full of frightening, jaw-dropping talent, but that alone — as the Euro 2016 final demonstrated — is never enough. Then there are Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, widely regarded as the greatest players of the modern era, who could well be appearing in a World Cup for the last time.

Messi has recently endured much heartbreak on national duty, Argentina finishing runner-up at the 2014 World Cup and the 2015 and 2016 editions of the Copa America. In the last of those finals, Messi missed a penalty in the shootout, after which he announced his retirement. But the little magician from Rosario was persuaded to return. It is flawed to contend that Messi needs a World Cup win to be considered among the best of all time. Football, after all, is not an individual sport; but there is no denying that such a triumph will immortalise him in the hearts of Argentine fans. Ronaldo, fresh off Champions League glory with Real Madrid, continues to spearhead Portugal’s challenge, displaying a phenomenal level of fitness and skill even at 33. For host Russia, the tournament is an opportunity to showcase itself to the world at a time when its relations with the West are severely strained. Its sporting reputation needs repairing too after a massive doping scandal. The decision to award the 2018 FIFA World Cup to Russia eight years ago was by no means a popular one. There were allegations of corruption, even if a report by FIFA’s Ethics Committee cleared the Russian bid team of wrongdoing. But all that could well be forgotten if the country delivers a successful World Cup. With the award of the 2022 edition to Qatar also under sustained spotlight, much is at stake for FIFA too.

Green ambitions — on renewable energy targets

In a surprising statement this month, Union Power Minister R.K. Singh said India would overshoot its target of installing 175 gigawatts of capacity from renewable energy sources by 2022. India was on track, he said, to hit 225 GW of renewable capacity by then. This is a tall claim, considering India has missed several interim milestones since it announced its 175 GW target in 2015. The misses happened despite renewable capacity being augmented at a blistering pace, highlighting how ambitious the initial target was. Technological and financial challenges remain: both wind and solar generation could be erratic, and India’s creaky electricity grid must be modernised to distribute such power efficiently. Meanwhile, wind and solar tariffs have hit such low levels that suppliers are working with wafer-thin margins. This means small shocks can knock these sectors off their growth trajectories. The obstacles have capped capacity addition to 69 GW till date, with India missing its 2016 and 2017 milestones. To hit its 2022 target of 175 GW, 106 GW will have to be added in four years, more than twice the capacity added in the last four.

In the solar sector alone, which the government is prioritising, policy uncertainties loom large. Manufacturers of photovoltaic (PV) cells have demanded a 70% safeguard duty on Chinese PV imports, and the Directorate General of Trade Remedies will soon take a call on this. But any such duty will deal a body blow to solar-power suppliers, who rely heavily on Chinese hardware, threatening the growth of the sector. There is also the problem of the rooftop-solar segment. Of the current goal of 100 GW from solar energy by 2022, 40 GW is to come from rooftop installations, and 60 GW from large solar parks. Despite being the fastest-growing renewable-energy segment so far — rooftop solar clocked a compound annual growth rate of 117% between 2013 and 2017 — India only hit 3% of its goal by the end of 2017, according to a Bloomberg New Energy Finance report. The reason? Homeowners aren’t warming up to the idea of installing photovoltaic panels on their terraces because the economics does not work out for them. Compared to industries and commercial establishments, a home typically needs less power and will not use everything it generates. So, homeowners need to be able to sell electricity back to the grid, which in turn needs a nationwide “net-metering” policy. As of today, only a few States have such policies, discouraging users elsewhere. Such challenges can be overcome with the right incentives, but they will take time to kick in. The good news is that even if India hits the 175 GW target, it stands to meet its greenhouse-gas emission goal under the Paris climate agreement. This in itself will be a worthy achievement. Overshooting this target will be a plus, but until the government tackles the policy challenges, it must hold off on implausible claims.

Ceasing fire: on truce in Afghanistan,The Taliban’s reciprocal truce against Afghan troops provides a glimmer of hope

The Taliban’s announcement of a three-day ceasefire with Afghan government troops for Eid, two days after President Ashraf Ghani declared an unconditional week-long ceasefire, is a glimmer of hope for a breakthrough in the long-struggling peace process. This is the first time the Taliban has announced a ceasefire in the 17 years since it was removed from power in Kabul. Though it has not acknowledged the government ceasefire, the timing and the public declaration unmistakably point to the reciprocity of the decision. In the past, Mr. Ghani’s government had tried several times to reach out to the Taliban to find a breakthrough in the conflict. In 2015, when both sides were in an advanced stage of talks, it was revealed that the Taliban leader Mullah Omar had died years ago, upending the whole process. In February, Mr. Ghani had invited the Taliban to shun weapons and join peace talks in return for security assurances and passports to militants. But the group shunned the offer after days of uncertainty. The surprise ceasefire declaration during Ramzan is the latest gambit by Mr. Ghani. The war has long entered a stalemate, and something needs to give. The Taliban has made enormous military gains in recent years. It now controls vast swathes of rural, mountainous Afghanistan, while the government retains its grip on the more populated urban centres. The Taliban doesn’t seem to be in a position to capture power by overthrowing the government as long as the U.S. and its allies remain committed to the regime’s security. Equally, Afghan forces are unable to defeat or even check the Taliban’s momentum in rural areas.

The fact that the government and the Taliban finally accepted a limited ceasefire suggests that the appetite for a political solution is now stronger. But a three-day Taliban ceasefire will not necessarily set the scene for a more productive engagement. The Taliban has said that the truce is applicable only to the “domestic opposition”, which means it will continue to target foreign troops. Also, the announcement came immediately after several attacks over 24 hours left at least 50 security personnel dead, which shows how precarious the situation is. Even for talks to be initiated, there are serious bottlenecks — the Taliban insists that foreign troops be withdrawn, while the government demands that the group accept the Afghan constitution. Despite these challenges, the Taliban’s positive response is a small gesture which could be used by both sides to build confidence before moving to the next step. The U.S. could put pressure on the Taliban through Pakistan to bring them to the table. If not, the war will carry on, with neither side gaining a decisive edge and leaving millions of Afghans in unending misery.

Thanking you so much for the higher acceptance and the surged way to occupy.

The light is always propagate through the vacuum and the speed of the light is not depend on the speed of emitting bodies.

It is impossible to create the higher velocity than light,

The beyond upward force of a submerged particle is directly proportional to the weight of the displaced fluid,the direction of the beyond force is always act on the upward direction.

No easy solutions: on tackling NPAs , A ‘bad bank’ is not a magic bullet; tackling NPAs requires other structural reforms as well

Union Minister Piyush Goyal, currently in charge of the Finance Ministry, has announced the formation of a committee to assess the idea of special asset reconstruction companies or asset management companies to take over bad loans from banks. The bankers’ panel has been given two weeks to revert. The idea of a ‘bad bank’ is not new. Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian had suggested the creation of a Public Sector Asset Rehabilitation Agency (PARA) to deal with what he described as India’s “festering twin balance sheet problem”. By this he meant over-leveraged corporates unable to service debt or invest afresh, and banks hit by non-performing assets (NPAs) cagey about fresh lending. This overhang hurts new investments and continues to dent India’s medium-term growth and job creation prospects. A professionally-run PARA, or the so-called ‘bad bank’, could assume custody of the largest and most difficult-to-resolve NPAs from lenders’ balance sheets. This would allow banks to focus on extending fresh credit and supporting the pick-up in growth. More importantly, a bad bank taking tough decisions on borrowers-gone-bad, it was argued, could free bankers from the risks entailed in large loan write-downs.

But there are good reasons why the Finance Ministry left the bad bank idea in the cold over the past year and a half – among them the fact that the new entity would need a lot of capital support, just as banks do. Some of this was envisaged as coming from the Reserve Bank of India through a complicated transaction. After a long debate within government, under Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, it was noted that setting up a new institution would be very time-consuming and there would be challenges on its ownership structure as well as the pricing of bad loans taken over from banks. In any case, going by the experience of private asset reconstruction companies, a PARA by itself would not be able to deploy dramatically different tools to extract better value from underlying assets and would, at best, amount to window-dressing bank books to attract investors. As former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan had pointed out, a government-owned bad bank could still face scrutiny from the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Central Vigilance Commissioner. For now, the government is clearly under pressure to demonstrate fresh intent to investors as India Inc believes bank loans are likely to remain sluggish for the next two-three years. Whether or not the knots in the bad bank idea are sorted out, the government should focus on other reforms as well. One, amend the Prevention of Corruption Act to shield bankers and officers from investigative witch-hunts. Two, back bankers to take demonstrable action against wilful defaulters. And three, take a hard look at what ails the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code.

Prevailing in Paris.. The new era of good

The thrust always realize us what is the importance of water.

The difficulty and failure of the life realize the importance of the success.

So don't forget to walk in the  difficult ways.

There is a tendency among tennis fans to take Rafael Nadal’s clay court dominance for granted. Ever since he won his first French Open in 2005, the Spaniard has single-handedly drained out almost all the suspense that Paris may have otherwise offered. On Sunday, when he held aloft the Roland Garros trophy for the 11th time in his career, after defeating his touted heir apparent Dominic Thiem, it was more of the same. The 32-year-old, ranked No. 1 in the world, was the overwhelming favourite ahead of the tournament and during the course of the two weeks there wasn’t an inkling of any change as Nadal lost just one set in the capture of his 17th Major overall. The victory pulled him level with Margaret Court for the most number of titles at a single Grand Slam tournament and made him only the second active men’s player — Roger Federer being the other — to win three or more after turning 30. The men’s field today is diminished and the oft-repeated argument is that with Federer absent and Novak Djokovic and Stan Wawrinka severely compromised, there was only so much that Nadal had to do. The truth, however, is never as simplistic. Probably no current player has changed gears and made as many tactical switches as Nadal, and it explains why along with Ken Rosewall and Pete Sampras he remains the only one to have won slams in his teens, 20s and 30s.

When Nadal arrived on the scene, he was deemed a player with a limited arsenal, stamina and muscularity his standout qualities. In his 20s he improved as a shotmaker, slicing and volleying better as he recorded five final appearances at Wimbledon from 2006 to 2011 and won two of them. As he neared his 30s, he elevated his serve and added more aggression to his game, especially on the forehand side. Now it is his backhand — once a liability — that stands out. With age, Nadal has tended to get more anxious and tight, and even choked on an occasion or two. But what has separated him from the rest is his courage on big points, the ability to loosen up and summon a winner when required. The hard-earned win over Thiem — despite the scoreline suggesting a routine straight sets affair — was yet another example of how Nadal has reinvented his game. On the women’s side, it was the turn of Simona Halep to reassess and recalibrate hers to claim a first Grand Slam title. The Romanian World No.1 had in fact lost three prior finals, including two in Paris, each of them in three tight sets, calling into question her mental make-up. On Saturday against American Sloane Stephens, she appeared down and out until midway through the match, before gaining a second wind to triumph.

AI garage? on kickstarting artificial intelligence

The NITI Aayog has published an ambitious discussion paper on kickstarting the artificial intelligence (AI) ecosystem in India. AI is the use of computers to mimic human cognitive processes for decision-making. The paper talks of powering five sectors — agriculture, education, health care, smart cities/infrastructure and transport — with AI. It highlights the potential for India to become an AI ‘garage’, or solutions provider, for 40% of the world. To pull this off, India would have to develop AI tools for a range of applications: reading cancer pathology reports, rerouting traffic in smart cities, telling farmers where to store their produce, and picking students at high risk of dropping out from school, among them. It is a tall order, but several countries have similar ambitions. The U.S., Japan and China have published their AI strategy documents and, importantly, put their money where their aspirations are. China, for example, plans to hand out a million dollars in subsidies to AI firms, as well as to run a five-year university programme for 500 teachers and 5,000 students. The NITI Aayog does not talk about how India’s ambitions will be funded, but proposes an institutional structure to get things going. This structure includes a network of basic and applied research institutions, and a CERN-like multinational laboratory that would focus on global AI challenges.

These are lofty goals, but they beg the question: can India bring it to pass? In answer, the NITI Aayog offers a sombre note of caution. India hardly has any AI expertise today. The paper estimates that it has around 50 top-notch AI researchers, concentrated in elite institutions like the IITs. Further, only around 4% of Indian AI professionals are trained in emerging technologies such as deep learning. And while India does publish a lot, these publications aren’t very impactful; India’s H-index, a measure of how often its papers are cited, is behind 18 other countries. This is not encouraging, considering that returns on AI are not guaranteed. The technology has tripped up as often as it has delivered. Among successes, a recent study found that a Google neural network correctly identified cancerous skin lesions more often than expert dermatologists did. India, with its acute shortage of specialist doctors in rural areas, could benefit greatly from such a tool. On the other hand, studies have found that AI image-recognition technologies do badly at identifying some races, because the data used to train them over-represent other races. This highlights the importance of quality data in building smart AI tools; India lacks this in sectors such as agriculture and health. Where data exist, this is poorly annotated, making it unusable by AI systems. Despite these formidable challenges, the scope of NITI Aayog’s paper must be lauded. The trick will be to follow it up with action, which will demand a strong buy-in from policymakers and substantial funds. The coming years will show if the country can manage this.

Thank you for watching me.

A lot of thanks to all the people who standing with the good one and always support to the good one.

life is always standing in the balance if you walk you will be stay in race.