NEWS ASIA
SINGAPORE
SINGAPORE ESTABLISHES AI ETHICS COUNCIL THE SINGAPORE GOVERNMENT has convened a council to
INDIA
ONE MILLION BANK WORKERS STRIKE UNION REPRESENTATIVES have claimed that around one million bank employees across India went on strike at the end of May to demand better pay and regulatory reform. The two-day strike saw thousands of bank branches – both public sector and commercial – close shop. Workers expressed their displeasure with a proposed pay raise of 2%, which was below the country’s inflation rate of 4.5%. The striking employees also called for a government crackdown on companies that do not pay back loans. India’s banks are weighed down by one of the highest levels of failing loans in the world’s emerging markets, reportedly worth more than US$120 billion. “It is big corporates who are attributable for losses to the banks,” Devidas Tuljapurkar of the United Forum of Bank Unions said. “But for no fault on their part, ordinary employees and officers are being denied their due share in profits.”
advise it on the ethical use of artificial intelligence (AI) and data. The council will be chaired by former Attorney-General V K Rajah, with remaining members appointed by the Minister for Communications and Information S Iswaran. It will look into “issues surrounding fairness, transparency, and the ability to explain an AI’s decision”. A new research programme will also “advance and inform scholarly research on AI governance issues”. The five-year programme will be led by the Singapore Management University, with support from the Infocomm and Media Development Authority and the National Research Foundation. “We must leverage frontier technologies such as AI,” Iswaran said. “It is a journey that private enterprises and consumers must walk together with the Government.”
HONG KONG
SAMSONITE CEO QUITS OVER RÉSUMÉ FRAUD RAMESH TAINWALA, CEO of luggage maker Samsonite, resigned in
June after being accused of résumé fraud. In its report on the company’ financial practices, activist fund manager Blue Orca claimed that Tainwala had at different points in his career presented himself as a doctor. Although his biography on Samsonite’s website omitted the reference, he was described as holding a Doctorate Degree in Business Administration in regulatory filings and in some media sources. “But when we called (the university’s) registrar, a representative told us that Tainwala never attained a doctorate, but that he merely enrolled in a programme from February 1992 to September 1993,” the report stated. The report went on to state that this was a “classic” example of résumé fraud. Samsonite has since announced that former Chief Financial Officer Kyle Gendreau would be Tainwala’s replacement in the top job.
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