News digest: Net neutrality, GES 2017, GST anti-profiteering body, and more

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday invited global entrepreneurs to invest and make in India

Nobody owns the Net: Trai backs open access

Within days of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposing a plan to dismantle the existing net neutrality regulations in the US, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has recommended upholding the basic principle of keeping the internet free. The proposals of Trai, when accepted by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), would ensure that no service provider can restrict, discriminate or interfere in the treatment of content by blocking, slowing down, degrading or granting preferential speeds while providing internet access. Read more

Bank consolidation as a reform is overstated: CEA Arvind Subramanian

Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian spoke to Business Standard journalists on a wide range of issues — from GDP growth and fiscal consolidation to job creation and the goods and services tax (GST). Edited excerpts: Your thoughts on the economy after demonetisation and the GST, and the prospects, going forward? There is a global export recovery. I think we can be part of that. Read more

GES 2017: Modi bats for Make in India, Ivanka for women power in biz
 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Ivanka Trump, US President Donald Trump’s daughter and presidential advisor, attended a gala dinner at the Falaknuma Palace here on Tuesday evening. Top captains of Indian industry and several budding entrepreneurs attended the dinner hosted by Modi. Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries; N Chandrasekaran, chairman of Tata Sons; Sunil Bharti Mittal of Bharti Airtel; Uday Kotak, managing director of Kotak Mahindra Bank; Shobana Kamineni, CII president, and Vice-Chairman at Apollo Hospitals and its founder Pratap C Reddy attended the dinner
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TCS rejigs delivery model, tells clients to embrace automation in projects

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has reached out to more than 800 clients, offering to reduce people in projects and embrace automation in delivering solutions and services, and disrupting its traditional outsourcing model it built over decades. India’s largest technology services firm has tasked its teams to reinvent how they deliver services: Reduce team strength, use artificial intelligence and newer software tools, and even cannibalise its own revenues, so that it retains clients and grows business. Read more

GST anti-profiteering body set up

The government has set up the National Anti-Profiteering Authority amid reports that some companies, particularly restaurants, are not passing on the benefit of the goods and services tax (GST) rate cuts to consumers. B N Sharma, additional secretary in the department of revenue, was on Tuesday appointed chairman of the authority. Read more