LEAD

Flagging the threat to financial viability of many countries from unsustainable debt levels, Prime Minister Narendra Modi Friday said trust in international financial institutions has eroded “partly because they have been slow to reform themselves”. Saying it is “not an easy task”, Modi called upon the “custodians of the leading economies and monetary systems of the world” to “bring back stability, confidence and growth to the global economy” at the first meeting of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors under India’s G20 Presidency.

In a pre-recorded video message at the start of the two-day meeting, the Prime Minister said many countries, especially developing economies, are still coping with the after-effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, which delivered a “once-in-a-century” blow to the global economy.

The Congress on Thursday accused the government of reducing India's democracy to "Hitlar-shahi" and "dictatorship" as it reacted angrily to the arrest of Pawan Khera but the ruling BJP shrugged off the criticism, saying the opposition party's leaders should not live in this misconception that they are above the law.

Congress leader Khera was stopped at the Delhi airport from flying to Raipur to attend the party's plenary session and was arrested soon after by the Assam Police in connection with an FIR over his alleged derogatory remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The UK government has for the first time publicly defended the BBC since the outcry over its controversial documentary on Narendra Modi and the income-tax surveys conducted at its offices in India, with a representative saying repeatedly in the UK Parliament that it has taken up these issues with New Delhi.

“We stand up for the BBC. We fund the BBC. We think the BBC World Service is vitally important. We want the BBC to have that editorial freedom,” David Rutley, parliamentary under-secretary for foreign, commonwealth and development affairs, said in a House of Commons debate on Tuesday titled “Raid of BBC Offices in India”.

He said the UK has “wide-ranging conversations with the Indian government. These issues have absolutely been raised as part of those conversations”.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday expressed hope that digital transactions will soon surpass cash with Unified Payments Interface (UPI) increasingly becoming the most preferred payment mechanism in the country. Modi after the launch of the cross-border connectivity between the UPI and PayNow of Singapore said about 74 billion transactions amounting to more than Rs 126 trillion, which is approximately 2 trillion Singapore dollar, was done through UPI in 2022.

"Many experts are estimating that very soon India's digital wallet transactions are going to overtake cash transactions," he said. A large number of transactions via UPI demonstrate that this indigenously designed payment system is very secure, he said.

A 6.4-magnitude earthquake on Monday rocked Turkey’s southern province of Hatay and northern Syria, killing three people and sparking fresh panic after a February 6 tremor that left nearly 45,000 dead in both countries.

Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said three people were killed and 213 were taken to hospital, while in Syria White Helmets said more than 130 people were injured and that some already damaged buildings had collapsed.