Washington, Oct 29: A group of Indian-American business owners have sought from the campaigns of President Donald Trump and his democratic rival Joe Biden a sound policy for revitalisation of small businesses severely impacted due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Noting that the pandemic has bought them on the verge of bankruptcy, the small business owners rued that the steps being taken by the current administration has not been able to rescue them from this crisis.
“COVID-19 pandemic has impacted everyone directly or indirectly around the world. Most of the Indian-American small business owners are struggling to pay basic expenses due to little or no income,” Dharmesh Verma, MCIS Multichoice Insurance Services, said.
Struggling to keep his business operational, Verma said there should be grants available to each business that can be used for the business expense and doesn’t have to pay back.
“It is a crucial time to support all the small businesses in America to revive the economy,” he said, adding that businesses are struggling and closing due to financial strains.
Ash Mirchandani, who is part of Las-Vegas based M Group, said small businesses employ half of the workforce and not only are these businesses closing in record numbers, they will also be leading to record unemployment in the months to come.
“Today there is no clear plan to get in front of this challenge. We have an administration that speaks a lot about the cause than the effect of this pandemic… And their efforts have fallen short and at best are band aids,” he said.
“We need sound public policy around small business revitalisation, there are many ideas, for example; providing financial aid to struggling small businesses so that they can stay open and keep the workforce employed, temporary sales tax holidays for small businesses, incentives for small businesses to hire. These are amongst many other solutions that will get the economic engines fired up,” Mirchandani said.
Chef Ranjan Dey, the owner of New Delhi restaurant in San Francisco, alleged that the mismanagement of Trump Administration has distilled into a domino effect which will shut down of 85 per cent of independently owned small family restaurant businesses in America.
Ajay Jain Bhutoria from the Biden campaign said that the Democratic presidential candidate believes the story of America is one of ordinary people doing extraordinary things.
“The small business and entrepreneurship community is a core part of the American community and their contributions are evident in every part of society — and they are critical to our collective success as a nation,” he said.
Kiran and Kashish Shinde, the couple who own Kashish Salon Inc in the Silicon Valley, hoped that the next administration pays attention to pain points of small business owners and brings appropriate measures to support small business owners like me.
“COVID-19 shutdown has immensely affected small businesses like Beauty Salons. I am a small business owner for multiple salons. No Protection for rent to be paid for shut down period Government did not think about the business owners who are renters. The government introduced short term rent protection but what about the pending or no paid rent for the lockdown period? Landlords are behind business owners to collect rents,” they said. (PTI)

LONDON, Oct 29: UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak has hailed a series of “ambitious” new UK-India initiatives across investment, trade, infrastructure, sustainable finance and research as he highlighted the role to be played by the UK’s capital markets in India’s infrastructure development.
The Indian-origin finance minister, addressing the UK-India Investing for Growth Forum on the sidelines of the UK-India 10th Economic and Financial Dialogue (EFD) on Wednesday, said that while a new Partnership on Infrastructure Policy and Financing will help catalyse private finance flows into India’s ambitious National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP), a new Sustainable Finance Forum would help green up the financial partnership between the two countries.
According to a high-level task force, India’s NIP has projected infrastructure investment of Rs 111 trillion during 2020-25.
“Sustainable finance provides a significant opportunity for the UK-India relationship. In the next 20 years, India is estimated to require USD 4.5 trillion of investment in sustainable infrastructure. The UK, with our deep and liquid capital markets, can play an enormous role in providing private finance to meet that need,” said Sunak, in a virtual address to the summit.
“Building on the unique strengths each country brings to our partnership – the UK’s deep and liquid capital markets and India’s extraordinary economic dynamism – together we can build an ambitious and exciting economic partnership and through our close and cooperative working relationship, show the way to global recovery,” he said.
The address followed his ministerial-level EFD dialogue, also held virtually with finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, earlier on Wednesday during which both sides concluded a broad range of agreements.
A new annual Financial Markets Dialogue between India and the UK to remove regulatory and market access barriers for British and Indian firms, is set to kick start with a meeting early next year.
It will be led by senior officials from the finance ministries of both countries and include the participation of financial regulators and private sector players.
“India holds huge potential for investors, and the Indian government’s ambitious vision for infrastructure financing is a massive opportunity to drive the post-pandemic global economy forwards,” said William Russell, the Lord Mayor of London.
“London has deep expertise in sustainable infrastructure investment, and this event is a huge opportunity to mobilise capital ahead of COP26,” he said, in reference to the UK’s presidency of the UN climate summit COP26 scheduled for November 2021.
A new strategic partnership to accelerate the development of Gujarat International Finance Tec (GIFT) City as an international financial centre, including regulatory capacity building support for the new International Financial Services Centre Authority, was also flagged as a means to drive international capital flows from the City of London to India.
“The UK is home to many world-class institutions from all stages of the investment lifecycle, from project conception to delivery and advisory. It is vital that we continue to leverage that expertise enabling us to collaborate ever more closely as we look ahead to COP26 in the UK next year,” said Catherine McGuinness, Policy Chair at the City of London Corporation.
The corporation, the governing body of the financial hub of the UK capital known as the Square Mile, said the private sector led UK-India Sustainable Finance Working Group, established earlier with the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), is already working on reducing barriers to sustainable investment.
“Much needs to be done to unlock capital for sustainable growth, and together with the members of our working group, we hope to take practical actions in the coming 12 months to accelerate investment into India and deliver progress ahead of COP26,” said the co-chairs of the working group – Hitendra Dave, Head of Global Banking and Markets, HSBC India, and Richard Abel, MD, UK Climate Investments.
The UK government highlighted that since its first EFD with India in 2007, bilateral trade between the two countries has more than doubled to nearly GBP 24 billion in 2019. (PTI)

Washington, Oct 29: Under fire from President Donald Trump and his allies, the CEOs of Twitter, Facebook and Google rebuffed accusations of anti-conservative bias at a Senate hearing and promised to aggressively defend their platforms from being used to sow chaos in next week’s election.
Lawmakers of both parties, eyeing the companies’ tremendous power to disseminate speech and ideas, are looking to challenge their long-enjoyed bedrock legal protections for online speech — the stated topic for the hearing but one that was quickly overtaken by questions related to the presidential campaign.
With worries over election security growing, senators on the Commerce Committee extracted promises from Twitter’s Jack Dorsey, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and Google’s Sundar Pichai that their companies will be on guard against meddling by foreign actors or the incitement of violence around the election results.
Testifying via video on Wednesday, the executives said they are taking several steps, including partnerships with news organisations, to distribute accurate information about voting. Dorsey said Twitter was working closely with state election officials.
“We want to give people using the service as much information as possible,” he said.
Republicans, led by Trump, have accused the social media platforms, without evidence, of deliberately suppressing conservative, religious and anti-abortion views, and they say that behavior has reached new heights in the contest between the president and Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., the committee’s chairman, said at the start of the hearing that the laws governing online speech must be updated because “the openness and freedom of the internet are under attack.”
Wicker cited the move this month by Facebook and Twitter to limit dissemination of an unverified political story from the conservative-leaning New York Post about Biden.
The story, which was not confirmed by other publications, cited unverified emails from Biden’s son Hunter that were reportedly disclosed by Trump allies.
“Twitter’s conduct has by far been the most egregious,” Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, told Dorsey. Cruz cited Twitter’s limitations on the newspaper story as part of “a pattern of censorship and silencing Americans with whom Twitter disagrees.”
“Who the hell elected you? And put you in charge of what the media are allowed to report?” Cruz asked.
Dorsey told Cruz that he does not believe that Twitter can influence elections because it’s only one source of information. He tried to steer senators away from conventional notions of political bias, noting that “much of the content people see today is determined by algorithms.”
He endorsed a proposal from computer scientist Stephen Wolfram that would allow third parties to guide how artificial intelligence systems choose what postings people see.
GOP senators raised with the executives an array of allegations of other bias on the platforms regarding Iran, China and Holocaust denial.
There’s no evidence that the social media giants are biased against conservative news, posts or other material, or that they favour one side of political debate over another, researchers have found. But Republicans aren’t alone in raising concerns about the companies’ policies.
Democrats focused their criticism mainly on hate speech, misinformation and other content that can incite violence, keep people from voting or spread falsehoods about the coronavirus. They criticized the tech CEOs for failing to police content, blaming the platforms for playing a role in hate crimes and the rise of white nationalism in the US.
Amid the debate, the Trump administration has asked Congress to strip some of the protections that have generally shielded the tech companies from legal responsibility for what people post on their platforms.
The proposals would make changes to a provision of a 1996 law that has been the foundation for unfettered speech on the internet.
Critics in both parties say that immunity under Section 230 of the law enables the social media companies to abdicate their responsibility to impartially moderate content.
Trump chimed in Wednesday with a tweet exhorting, “Repeal Section 230!” The CEOs argued that the liability shield has helped make the internet what it is today, though Zuckerberg said he believes that Congress “should update the law to make sure it’s working as intended.”
Dorsey and Pichai urged caution in making any changes.
But the executives also rejected accusations of bias.
“We approach our work without political bias, full stop,” Pichai said.
“To do otherwise would be contrary to both our business interests and our mission.”
The companies in recent years have wrestled with how strongly to intervene with speech.
They have often gone out of their way not to appear biased against conservative views — a posture that some say effectively tilts them toward those viewpoints.
The effort has been especially strained for Facebook, which was caught off guard in 2016, when it was used as a conduit by Russian agents to spread misinformation benefiting Trump’s presidential campaign.
Wednesday’s session lacked the in-person drama of star-witness proceedings before the coronavirus outbreak.
The hearing room was nearly empty except for Wicker and a few colleagues, as most senators took part remotely, but their questioning was sharp as tempers flared among members. (Agencies)

Washington, Oct 29: US President Donald Trump has accused both the mainstream and social media companies of blocking serious charges of corruption against his rival and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, saying the situation was causing America to experience suppression of the press.
Trump said the media was not willing to write against Biden and his family.
“Here is a guy who gets caught and the media doesn’t want to write about it. You know what they call it not freedom of the press but suppression of the press,” Trump said during his election allies on Wednesday in the battle ground State of Arizona.
Trump was referring to the allegations of corruption against Hunter Biden, son of Joe Biden.
As reported by The New York Post and alleged by Trump and his eldest son Donald Trump Jr, Hunter Biden received money from the Russians, the Chinese and the Ukrainians.
However, Joe Biden and his family has denied any wrongdoing.
At multiple election rallies, Trump alleged that the mainstream media has not be writing about the corruption charges against the Biden family.
“We don’t have freedom of the press…..We have suppression of the press and there’s never been a time when its more obvious than right now,” Trump said.
“I mean honestly its a disgrace, the whole thing is a con job and he should have never been the candidate and you know what they have a corrupt party and all of this work being done by Big Tech and being done by the media that should be considered a major, massive billion-dollar campaign contribution because that’s what it is,” he said at a political Rally in Bullhead City of Arizona.
Trump alleged that the mainstream does not want to look at the information being made available from the laptop of Hunter Biden.
“It’s called the laptop from hell. This is the greatest laptop I’ve ever seen. This thing is gold. It’s gold except for the news that doesn’t want to look at it. They refuse to look at it,” he said.
Trump alleged Joe Biden and his family received money from China, Ukraine and Russia.
“The money from China, Ukraine, Russia… The wife of the mayor of Moscow gave him (USD) 3.5 million, the son. The son had no job, no nothing, got USD 3.5 million. They put him on the board of Burisma, USD 183,000 a month and I understand a USD 3 million upfront payment,” Trump claimed, alleging that China gave him USD 1.5 billion.
Trump also accused Joe Biden of letting China plunder American jobs.
“Joe was personally involved in establishing corrupted business dealings with China. At the same time, he was letting China plunder our jobs and destroy our businesses, our factories, our workers,” Trump said. (PTI)

ISLAMABAD, Oct 29 : A Pakistan MP speaking in Parliament on Wednesday claimed that fearing an attack by India, the Government had abruptly released Indian Air Force pilot  captured last February after a dogfight between Indian and Pakistani pilots.
In a speech in the National Assembly, Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) leader Ayaz Sadiq said that Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had in an important meeting pointed out that if Pakistan did not release Abhinandan Varthaman, India would attack Pakistan “that night by 9 pm.”
Dunya News quoted Sadiq making this claim during a parliament session.
The PML-N leader told opposition leaders that Qureshi in a meeting with the parliamentary leaders, including PPP and PML-N and Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa, had asked for Abhinandan to be let free.
“I remember Shah Mahmood Qureshi was in the meeting in which Imran Khan had refused to attend and Chief of Army Staff General Bajwa came into the Room, his legs were shaking and he was perspiring. Foreign Minister said for God’s sake let Abhinandan go, India’s about to attack Pakistan at 9 PM”, Member of Parliament Sadiq recounted the events of the important meeting.
Dunya News further quoted Sadiq as saying that the opposition has supported the government in all issues including Abhinandan but will not be able to further support it.
Wing Commander Varthaman shot into limelight after he shot down a Pakistani aircraft F-16, which had transgressed into the Indian airspace during a dog fight between Indian and Pakistani air force in February 2019 and in the process, his plane crossed over to Pakistani side and was shot down.
Abhinandan was returned to India from the Attari-Wagah border on March 1.