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MIT to honour six Indian-American scientists |
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Six Indian-Americans are among 35 young scientists who will be honoured by the prestigious Technology Review journal of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for innovations and research that are found to be “most promising and exciting”.”Innovative technology has provided America its driving force as well as its competitive edge. And in recent years Indian-Americans have been contributing a significant slice of this technology - far in excess of their present population in the United States,” said INDOlink, a prominent website covering a range of issues.
The Indian-Americans chosen for the award are: Prithwish Basu of BBN Technologies, Ram Krishnamurthy of Intel, Ashok Maliakal of Lucent Technologies' Bell Laboratories, Anand Raghunathan of NEC Laboratories America, Jay Shendure of Harvard Medical School and Sumeet Singh of Cisco Systems Inc.
Indian-Americans comprise just under one per cent of the country's population, but their contribution to innovative technology is 12-17 per cent, according to the Technology Review (TR) magazine.
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Indian NRI students to be given equal rights
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NRI students studying in India will soon be given equal rights, including in fees and opportunities, as other students, Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi told representatives of Indian communities in Vienna, Austria. “The Indian government is concerned about the high fees that educational institutions are charging NRI students,” he said.
Pointing out that the Supreme Court had directed private educational institutions to reserve 15 percent seats for NRI students and permitted them to decide the fees to be charged from them, Ravi said: “The state governments feel that NRIs can afford it. But the government will hold discussions with the managements of educational institutions and persuade them to be more realistic towards NRIs.”
“Our efforts towards establishing a university for PIOS (Persons of Indian Origin) is going on the fast track. There is some bureaucratic delay. It will soon become a reality,” said
Ravi.
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Gulf firms pay Indians high wages
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Fast rising salaries in India and increasing costs of living in the Gulf, are forcing employers in the region to offer above-average pay packets to retain Indian professionals, says a new survey. The report by GulfTalent.Com, an online recruitment firm based in Dubai, says while expatriates continued to migrate into the Gulf, particularly Dubai, some workers were leaving the region as high inflation had eroded their savings potential. The tightening labour market was forcing companies to reach out to new sources of talent, including recent graduates, women, and workers from China and Malaysia, it said. It was also reducing the pay gap between Indian professionals and their Arab and Western counterparts in the region, the survey said.
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NRI workers in Saudi Arabia to get compulsory health insurance
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Nearly seven million expatriates in Saudi Arabia including nearly one million NRIs will come under the cooperative health insurance scheme by the end of this year.
The Saudi Health Minister Dr Hamad Al Manie said in Jeddah that health insurance has been made mandatory for all expatriate workers who will now need an insurance card to get or renew their work permit. Incidentally, the new cooperative health insurance scheme will fetch Saudi Riyals 30 billion ($8.3 billion) in investment and create a large number of jobs for Saudis. |
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Asian entrepreneurs blaze a trail in UK
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It's boom time for Asian entrepreneurs, particularly the NRIs in Britain, who are creating wealth at three times the pace of the country's economic growth while dramatically shifting to hi-tech sectors, according to a new study published in The Daily Telegraph.
The real wealth of Asian business people jumped by 69 per cent between 1998 and 2005, according to Barclays, whose business banking division carried out the survey analysing the fortunes of the UK's 200 richest Asians in the eight years. Over the same period, the UK economy grew by 22.8 per cent.
Number one was Mike Jatania who, with his family, sits atop a branded cosmetics business, Lornamead, valued at £650 million followed by Patel brothers, Vijay and Bikhu, worth £455 million who have been on a 30-year mission to create an “Asian Glaxo”. Third on the list is Lord Swraj Paul, whose Caparo group has sales of £650 million.
“Asian wealth is now built on a much broader base of entrepreneurs who are challenging traditional stereotypes and making serious money in high-tech industries,” Satish Kanabar, corporate director of Barclays business banking, said. |
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H-1B visa holders paid less than Americans |
H-1B visa holders from India are “taken advantage of” and, contrary to claims by US industry, are paid less salary than similarly qualified American citizens, says a new study. “Our wage per employee is 20-25 per cent less than US wages for a similar employee,” Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) vice president Phiroz Vandrevala said. “Typically, for a TCS employee with five years experience, the annual cost to the company is $60,000-70,000, while a local American employee might cost $80,000-100,000,” he said, according to the study by IEEE-USA, a unit of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.
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