Quick notes: Amazon drivers | Border villages...

• Relentless greed: Amazon apologises after falsely denying that drivers are, at times, forced to urinate in plastic bottles after employees confirmed the same.
  
  Biden singles out Amazon for not paying federal taxes



• Licorice for Covid? Scientists from Manesar have found that an ingredient in Mulethi (Yashthimadhu) has the potential to emerge as a drug candidate against SARS-CoV-2 as it lowers the severity of the disease and brings down viral replication.



• China Building Villages in Indian Himalayas: “Beijing advanced the expansionism in South China Sea not by directly employing force but through asymmetrical and hybrid warfare. That success has emboldened China and it has taken that playbook to the Himalayan borderlands”.



• Bodhidharma: The legendary Bodhidharma gave up his throne to become a monk and propagate Zen Buddhism that he founded. He gave physical training to the monks of Shaolin, from which kung fu and other martial arts evolved.




• Ghar Wapsi: At 47%, Hinduism biggest gainer in religious conversion in Kerala . . . . . expect more in the coming decades



• Data warfare: Russian law requires smart devices to come pre-installed with domestic software.



• On-board generator: Potential game-changer for making fully electric viable for larger trucks




• Satyameva Jayate: Salvatore Babones in Foreign Policy Mag:
  
  Farm incomes in Punjab and Haryana are the highest in India, with the average farmer earning more than twice the national average. They also garner the lion’s share of govt support. More than 90 percent of their cropland is covered by heavily subsidized irrigation. And the govt buys almost the entire output of Punjab and Haryana farmers at minimum support prices that are set far above market levels. The results are huge and growing official stockpiles of wheat and rice, much of which ends up being given away to the country’s poor—or simply rotting in place.
  
  The Jat farmers of Punjab and Haryana have long lobbied India’s govt to maintain an agricultural system that is both economically wasteful and environmentally destructive. And why shouldn’t they? India is a democracy, and in a democracy, the squeaky wheel gets the grease—and the subsidies.



• On Being Quiet: