| | Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led Cabinet on Wednesday approved a Rs 19,744 crore incentive plan to promote the manufacturing of green hydrogen in the country in a bid to cut emissions. Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur said the Cabinet approved the National Green Hydrogen Mission which is expected to attract Rs 8 lakh crore of investment in the green hydrog India aims to produce 5 million tonnes of green hydrogen per annum in the next five years and the incentives would help bring down the cost. HT brings you a round-up of the most important and interesting stories, so you don’t miss your daily dose of news. | THE BIG STORY Green hydrogen plan gets nod from Cabinet In an ambitious move aimed at improving India’s energy security and helping the country cut carbon dioxide emissions, the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday approved an initial outlay of ₹19,744 crore for the National Green Hydrogen Mission up to 2029-30, including incentives to attract investments worth ₹8 lakh crore and create 600,000 direct jobs. The mission is expected to cut around 50 million tonnes of carbon emissions. Read more. | THE BIG QUESTION What do forensic results of the car reveal about the Sultanpuri death? No evidence has been found so far of the 20-year-old Sultanpuri victim’s presence inside the grey Baleno that dragged her for at least 14km, but traces of blood were present on the wheels and the base of the car, indicating that she was stuck under it, forensic officials said on Wednesday. Five men in the car allegedly hit the victim, Anjali Kumari, who was riding a scooter with her friend Nidhi as the pillion rider in Sultanpuri on New Year’s night, and the impact left her trapped under the vehicle, which then drove on for at least two hours, dragging the body before it got dislodged in a mutilated state and was found by local residents in outer Delhi’s Kanjhawala. Read more. | STORIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED | | |  At 27, PV Sindhu is the only Indian on Forbes’s list of top-earning athletes in 2022. She ranks 12, with $7.1 million. Messi leads with $130 million. Which Los Angeles Lakers basketballer trails him with $121 million? | | | From the Edit Page Budget: Look for ways to reduce tax disputes As finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman prepares the Union Budget for 2023-24, it is worth recalling her Budget speech from 2019, when she quoted Tamil poet Pisiranthaiyar’s allegory for government-taxpayer relations, “A few mounds of rice from paddy, that is harvested from a small piece of land, would suffice for an elephant. But what if the elephant itself enters the field and starts eating? What it eats would be far less than what it would trample over.” An imaginative mind might see the shape of an agitated elephant in the adjoining chart, which plots direct tax collection under dispute at the end of a year, as a percentage of the gross direct tax collection during that year. The year-on-year change reflects the net change during the year, as some disputes get resolved, while others get instituted. Read more. | NUMBER THEORY Majority of India’s bank employees no longer in public sector banks 2021-22 was a milestone year in Indian banking industry. The share of bank employees in public sector banks fell below the 50% mark for the first time in history. Given the fact that public sector banks (PSBs) are among the last remaining bastions of trade unions in India, and the government has not been able to push big-ticket privatisation of PSBs, this development is yet another example of the market-driven, changing landscape of the banking industry. To be sure, the restructuring of PSBs by the government is expected to have played a role in the reduction of workforce. Read more. | FROM THE FIELD Two states: A disputed border area that enjoys benefits of none “How did ‘gaum’ become ‘gavi’?” Fifty-five-year-old Lakshman Shindolkar asks, posing the question at the centre of a seven-decade-long border row between two of India’s richest states, Maharashtra and Karnataka. Sitting on a sofa in his two-room house in a quiet Belagavi neighbourhood, the usually sanguine Shindolkar is animated, and angry. The question, after all, defines Belagavi’s politics, and his life. In October 2014, the Karnataka cabinet, then helmed by Congress chief minister Siddaramaiah, renamed the district of Belgaum, with its over 1,200 villages on the Karnataka-Maharashtra border, to Belagavi. “I can’t get myself to say Belagavi. It is just another way to undermine Marathi in the district,” Shindolkar said. Read more. | | | Infographic of the Day  (Click to expand) |  LeBron James | Photo of the Day A “love poem” composer | HT This Day: January 5, 1934 Nadir Shah’s murder  (Click to expand) Altogether fourteen persons, besides Abdulkhaliq, the assassin, and Mahmood were found guilty of conspiracy to assassinate King Nadirshah and were sentenced to death by a special Jirga consisting of Ulemas and Cabinet Ministers Read more. | Please share you feedback with us What do you think about this newsletter? | Were you forwarded this email? Did you stumble upon it online? Sign up here. | | | | | | | | | Get the Hindustan Times app and read premium stories | | | | | | View in Browser | Privacy Policy | Contact us You received this email because you signed up for HT Newsletters or because it is included in your subscription. Copyright © HT Digital Streams. All Rights Reserved | | | | |
