Quick notes: Neutrino observatory | Pandemic commute...

• Warning from Indian scientists: India will lose edge over rivals if neutrino project delayed by another year.. An underground laboratory proposed in Tamil Nadu has been a non-starter for years. "After a year, other competitors will be ahead of us and there is no second prize for discovery in science. The detector technology which TIFR and related institutes built is unique in the world. We have a unique way to do the experiment with proven ideas that no one in the world can match." 
  
  China will complete the construction of  Underground Neutrino Observatory by 2022. Other neutrino experiments, such as Hyper-Kamiokande (Hyper-K) in Japan and the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) in the USA, are also under construction.



• Project Hanson: How Chinese military contractor acquired Michigan dual-use manufacturer



• First of five: China's first domestically built aircraft carrier to be combat-ready by year-end. Four more are in the works.



• Karnataka can't keep China out of electric buses: India may have made rules to curb Chinese imports, but a look at transport corporations' efforts to procure 490 electric buses shows that there is no alternative to Chinese products for now, at least in the electric vehicle sector. . . . . world champs in history debates.



• US grid-battery costs dropped 70% over 3 years: Future grids will be dominated by solar and wind with battery storage to smooth out the supply from variable generators. 



• Lesson for India's massive solar farms: Managing vegetation should be among the first things to consider when developing large-scale solar. 



• Rad’s E-Bike Disrupts America’s Pandemic Commute: Convincing customers that they can use the bikes to replace at least some car trips. 



• Tern GSD Cargo Bike:




• San Diego fraudster: Nimesh Shah, 37, was sentenced to almost four years in jail for defrauding the Department of Veterans Affairs out of nearly $30 million



• Interest from India and abroad: Tirupati's National Sanskrit University online courses evoke positive response from students 



• Dictionary of Dravidian Languages: Unique dictionary covering 4 Dravidian languages ready

Quick notes: Desi drones | Globalization rethink...

• Raising a swarm: India’s R&D spending on drone technologies is not even equal to the annual maintenance costs of the fleet of imported systems. The lack of a long-term acquisition plan or a roadmap, a version of the Integrated Guided Missile Development program for drones, means there is virtually no indigenous ecosystem for UASes. Worse, all the major components for lightweight drones, the auto-pilot or the brain of the machine, the battery pack, the motherboard and the propellers and motors, are imported, the majority from the world leader in drones, China.
  
  There is exactly one project which currently holds out a glimmer of hope for futuristic military projects, the Mehar Baba Swarm Drone Competition, an IAF-funded project for creating swarm drones. The winner of the contest to build a fleet of 50 drones to deliver humanitarian assistance and disaster relief will bag a Rs 100 crore IAF contract. But such projects, which bring in the brightest in Indian industry, are few and far between... Unmanned surveillance gives us a huge tactical advantage on the seas, which satellite and aircraft-based surveillance don’t
  
  Developers point to Turkey, which has built up an ecosystem over the past 15 years and is now a world leader in armed drones. Turkish armed drones have tipped the scales in virtually every recent conflict in its extended neighbourhood, from Syria and Libya to Nagorno Karabakh. It might only be a matter of time before drones appear in our neighbourhood too, as a wake-up call.



• Latest terror strategy: Pakistan using Chinese drones to airdrop weapons in Indian border areas



• VikAss is visible: “Look at, India, it’s so filthy, the air is filthy”.



• Turns out, globalization wasn't such a blessing: Back in the ’90s, when the post-Cold War consensus was just emerging, economists tended to take a simplistic either-or view of trade—either you were a free trader or a protectionist—and forced people to choose sides.
  
  Paul Krugman branded just about everybody who questioned the rapid pace of globalization a fool who didn’t understand economics very well. Now Krugman has come out and admitted that his own understanding of economics has been seriously deficient as well. Many of these working-class communities have been hit hard by Chinese competition, which economists made a “major mistake” in underestimating, Krugman says.
  


• The Economics Nobel Isn’t Really A Nobel: Technically, there is no Nobel Prize in economics. The Nobel Foundation doesn’t pay out the award or choose the winner, but it does list the prize on its website along with the Nobels. Members of the Nobel family have spoken out against the award.



• JEE (Main) to be conducted in regional languages from 2021: “Top-scoring countries in PISA examination use mother tongue as a medium of instruction”.



• JioPages: A made-in-India browser that focuses on data-privacy, JioPages is available in eight Indian languages.. The rising anti-Google sentiment among a section of Indian entrepreneurs could work in JioPages’ favour.



• Re-embrace the bicycle:

One distressing thing I have noticed in our corner of rural India is the steady decline of the bicycle, replaced by the motorcycle. Distances as short of 1-2 km are routinely covered by motorcycles.

Recently in my ancestral village a speeding motorcycle killed a morning walker.

— Sridhar Vembu (@svembu) October 20, 2020




• Why rooftop solar isn’t shining in sunny India: Smart meters coupled with time-of-the day tariffs could be the answer.



• Shenzhen SEZ: Lessons from the hardware capital of the world. “In India, SEZs are identified with tax and exchange control relaxations. But the Chinese SEZs were basically areas exempted from the application of various domestic laws, rules and procedures by giving each SEZ chief wide discretion to adapt international best practices.”
  
  While tax breaks and concessions are essential, they are not enough to sustain an environment conducive to business. This just proves that at the end of the day, there is no replacement for effective governance.



• Living Without Ego:

Quick notes: Manufacturing exports | R&D spending...

• VikAss not working: India’s manufacturing exports are declining BIG time, while raw material exports are going up. In contrast rivals like Vietnam and Bangladesh managed to post positive figures for their export of manufactures ranging from garments to light engineering. . . . Superpower in history debates



• The next China? India first needs to beat Bangladesh. Even without the pandemic, India might have eventually lost the race to Bangladesh which is taking a leaf out of China’s playbook. China held on to high GDP growth for decades by carving out for itself a far bigger dominance of low-skilled goods manufacturing than warranted by the size of its labor pool.  However, India has gone the other way, choosing not to produce the things that could have absorbed its working-age population of 1 billion into factory jobs.
  



• Leaving the rest of the world behind: China's economy roars back to life while activity in the US, Europe and Japan shrinks.. China is the only region where supply and demand have both recovered. It has achieved this with a much smaller fiscal stimulus package. 



• EV hub: Tesla Inc will start exporting China-made Model 3 cars to more than 10 European countries this month, joining a growing number of automakers using China as an export hub for electric vehicles.



• Royal Enfield: An Indian-made motorcycle with a retro look Is coming after Harley... In its last financial year before the pandemic struck, the company sold about 824,000 bikes globally. Harley, by contrast, shipped about 218,000.




• Why Govt R&D Spending Does Matter: A 10% increase in govt-financed R&D generates a 5% to 6% additional increase in privately funded R&D resulting in productivity gains.

yes. IIT/eng/medical education has been generous 'foreign aid' give by india to the US. at the cost of universal primary education. i once wrote that the middle class hijacked indian edu budgets for the benefit of their kids. IITs are "finishing school for the middle class" 1/2

— Prof राजीवः श्रीनिवासः (@RajeevSrinivasa) October 17, 2020




• Anti-submarine warfare: DRDO’s SMART missile could be trump card against China’s submarines



• Obsessed with fair skin: 'Name one dark-skinned superstar in Bollywood'.



• Help the traditional goldsmiths:

#Tanishq episode should now be used to benefit small time hindu goldsmiths , the traditional sunyaras who sit in small shops...
Let's make their #Diwali beautiful from now onwards
Pls encourage all your family & freinds to do so!

— Ritu (सत्यसाधक) #EqualRightsForHindus (@RituRathaur) October 14, 2020




• De-paving the streets: 800km of lesser-used roads in Sydney to be replaced with pedestrian networks, community spaces and market gardens.



• Larry Summers: America would have saved trillions had it handled the pandemic as well as Pakistan 

Quick notes: Perovskites | Harambee...

• Solar is now king: A group of materials called perovskites are being used to create the next generation of solar panels.
  
  More coal plants have closed during President Trump’s first term than during the entire 8 years Obama was in office. Renewables will account for 80% of growth in global electricity generation. 



• US politics: India better not take sides

No idea why some ppl in India take the US elections and the result there so personally. You can’t shape the outcome but you can hurt India’s interests by appearing to influence their elections. India has to and will work with whoever wins there. 1/2

— Yusuf Unjhawala 🇮🇳 (@YusufDFI) October 15, 2020




• Hybrid war: The PLA has been developing hybrid war strategies over a period of time. A Chinese data mining company had been tracking 'big data' of over 10,000 Indian individuals. China will probably in due course make experimental attempts to target a few Indian networks as part of its cyber capability. North East India and the Red Corridor remain vulnerable to Chinese manipulation.





• Harambee: The law of generosity that rules Kenya... Indian migrants working alongside Kenyans called on Hare, the divine potency of God, and Ambe, the goddess of power, energy and invincibility. The Kenyan workers often joined in, and soon, this combined Indian chant of “Hare” and “Ambe” became a uniquely Kenyan rallying call of unification.



• Bengaluru needs a million wells: Precious rainwater that could recharge the aquifers instead flows down the buildings and tarred roads of the city as surface run-off, choking sewers and inundating low-lying areas. If the city can dig a million wells, 50-60% percolation of rainwater can be achieved and urban flooding avoided.



• Vegan Fest: Thai company is getting rich by turning Jackfruit into meat.



• Rebuild the collapsed shikhara of the Konark Sun Temple":

I ask for a public campaign in India to seek reconstruction of the collapsed shikhara of the Konark Sun Temple. (The white part in the figure is collapsed.)

(Such reconstruction has been done elsewhere as in the world-famous Prambanan Temple in Indonesia). pic.twitter.com/2VekovlRyd

— Subhash Kak (@subhash_kak) October 11, 2020




• Not one Big Bang: The universe goes through cycles of death and rebirth. There have been multiple Big Bangs, with more on the way.. Black holes hold clues to the existence of previous universes.



• Koe Knuffelen: With immense mental health benefits, the practice of embracing cows has growing global appeal. 



• Indus Valley Civilization: Rare ancient DNA provides window into a 5,000-Year-Old South Asian civilization

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Quick notes: Phoren edu | App store...

• Yale, Oxford campuses in India? Modi govt pushing for changes in laws



• Swadeshi app store: More than 150 startups and firms in India are working to form an alliance and toying with the idea of launching an app store to cut their reliance on Google, Apple



• India eyeing Embraer’s commercial aircraft division: That Brazil has also floated the Embraer bid to China has added urgency to the discussions. 
  



• Make in India? Boeing F/A-18 Block III Super Hornets could be headed to India
  



• HAL choppers are ideal for China border: For such a small, light helicopter, the LCH is a formidable fighting machine.



• Tata Super-App: Tata taking on Mukesh Ambani could be India's Alibaba-Tencent



• Motor Cart: 18-year-old Muhammad Shibin from Kerala's Mallapuram designs a unique motor cart.




• KPs definitely supported article 370 until 1990 happened.:

When I tell RW Hindus that KPs were basically running India between 1947 and 1984, they look at me like I am from Mars. Seriously guys. This isn't some cooked up myth. pic.twitter.com/dp546TVynt

— Frank (@FrankBullit67) September 24, 2020




• What they don’t teach you in school :

Here’s what they don’t teach you in school about the British rule over India.

There’s a misguided idea that India should be grateful for the trains, democracy and law that the British empire ‘gave them’. pic.twitter.com/ThHuFouBUL

— VICE UK (@VICEUK) August 21, 2020

Quick notes: Failed SEZs | Minus 40 celsius...

• Why Indian SEZs failed: India's SEZ "reforms" largely centered around concessions to favored businesses--tax sops and cheap real estate—rather than a fundamental reset of India’s convoluted and restrictive rules for doing business. If low taxes were all that mattered for attracting investment, any poor country could entice global manufacturers by slashing taxes. Clearly, good governance and strong rule of law matter a great deal more to such businesses.
  
  Whereas the Shenzhen agglomeration alone sprawls across 2,000 square km, all of India’s SEZs put together occupy less than 500 square km. Larger zones benefit from several spillover effects: They attract clusters of businesses, encourage knowledge transfers from foreign to domestic companies, and spread employment, infrastructure and development to neighboring regions. India’s zones are too small to do the same.



• Banned Chinese apps re-enter in new avatars: India is too lucrative a market to lose for Chinese companies and they would make every effort to return. “If the app ban doesn’t subside in a few months, banned apps in new avatars will crop up.



• Battlefront at minus 40 Celsius: The Eastern Ladakh area witnesses the harshest winters where temperatures normally dip to minus 35 degrees in the night during winters coupled with high-speed freezing winds.
  



• China's unmanned plateau helicopter makes maiden flight: The AR-500C drone will be used in missions including reconnaissance and communication relay, with optional functions including electronic disruption, target indication, fire strikes, cargo delivery, and nuclear radiation and chemical contamination reconnaissance.



• Make these in India: Bollinger plans to make new electric Deliver-E van with 200 miles of range
  
  
  


• Sri Lanka returns hazardous waste to UK: Several other countries in the region have recently begun to return waste imported from foreign countries.  In January, Malaysia returned 42 shipping containers of illegally imported plastic waste to the UK.



• "Detox My Fashion": Textile dyeing is one of the most polluting aspects of the global fashion industry, devastating the environment and posing health hazards to humans. The discharge is often a cocktail of carcinogenic chemicals, dyes, salts and heavy metals that not only hurt the environment, but pollute essential drinking water sources.



• May his ilk grow: A ray of hope for the vernacular

@sankrant I have started teaching computer programming/coding in Gujarati via weekly facebook live sessions. Page: https://t.co/ogwz8FZQyN Thank you for re-igniting that flame in me :) 🙏

— चिराग: Chirag Patel (@chipmap) September 24, 2020




• “We took a page from Big Tobacco’s playbook”: Tobacco companies initially just sought to make nicotine more potent. But eventually that wasn't enough to grow the business as fast as they wanted. And so they added sugar and menthol to cigarettes so you could hold the smoke in your lungs for longer periods. At Facebook, we added status updates, photo tagging, and likes, which made status and reputation primary and laid the groundwork for a teenage mental health crisis. To continue to grow the user base and in particular, the amount of time and attention users would surrender to Facebook, they needed more.



• EU's China weak spot: Germany had been particularly reluctant to speak out on Hong Kong repression as it hoped to secure an investment deal with China by year's end.