2019 nCoV: Local tourism operators feel the crunch

The nation’s tourism economy is suffering billion-dollar losses with its largest tourist demographic facing tight travel restrictions

With Chinese travel restrictions set following the recent corona epidemic, concerns have been raised by Australia’s tourism industry about a potential revenue loss of one billion dollars.

Following the novel coronavirus (2019nCoV) outbreak, the Department of Home Affairs announced in late January that Australia will deny entry to anyone who has left or transited mainland China from 1 February.

Mainland Chinese travellers who managed to reach Australia from 1 February 2020 have had their visas cancelled and have been placed in a detention area for quarantine.

The travel advisory to China currently stands at Level 4 - Do Not Travel - and includes travel to all of mainland China.

Travel operators have already begun to feel the crunch. Simrranjit Siingh of the Sydney-based Fortune World Travel told Indian Link, “With cancelled operations, passengers who had booked have been affected already. The advisory against travel is until 29 March so until then we will feel the impact for sure.”

He added, “The travel industry is usually the first to feel an immediate impact by issues such as communicable diseases or terrorism. With China involved, it is even more impactful, given they are a huge market in our industry. The China-US trade wars alone saw IATA projections down 25-30%. In recent weeks, we’ve seen the Chinese New Year traffic affected.”

Sudhir Warrier, Executive Chairman of the Australian Cruise Group, a major Sydney-based travel business, agrees there are there are significant concerns at this point.

“The impact I believe could last upwards of three months,” he told Indian Link.

“In fact I think it has been underplayed for two reasons: one, the travel ban has been extended, and two, no one in China is booking a holiday currently. With this double effect, it will be some time before we regain momentum.”

Warrier’s fleet of cruise boats - including Sydney Showboat, Magistic Cruises and Clearview Glass Boat - take a significant share of the China tourist business.

“Travel is down from other countries like Japan and Korea as well,” he noted. “There’s a level of paranoia. Other destinations within the country such as Cairns that don’t see much domestic travellers will be severely impacted.”

“My other concern is for the huge logistical infrastructure in our industry; the travel buses, the tour guides, the support staff, the supply chains - there will be significant disruption there.”

That the virus has come on top of the bushfire crisis has been an added worry for the travel industry.

Simrranjit Siingh observed, “With the bushfires, we could influence the consumer by saying you won’t be travelling to the interior. But when there’s a global health issue, travellers are rightfully wary, no one wants to risk it. To have had such a bad start to the year, the next six months will be difficult.”

Luckily, he notes that there’s been no change in passengers coming inward from India. As well, the T20 World Cup is round the corner, and there are hopes from there.

The government has announced that the travel ban will be reviewed soon. Extension of the ban is subject to the advice of medical professionals.

Latest reports show that 12 cases of the virus have been confirmed in Australia.

Rajni Anand Luthra and Nisha Sreenivasan

Group of ministers formed to tackle coronavirus threat

A Group of Ministers (GoM) has been formed to deal with the coronavirus on the instructions of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It includes Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri, Foreign Minister S.S. Jaishankar, Minister of State for Home Kishan Reddy, Minister of State for Health Ashwani Kumar Choubey and Minister of State for Shipping Mansukh Lal Mandavia.

The GoM constituted by the Prime Minister will look after operations related to the preparation, management, review and evaluation of the prevention of coronavirus in the country.

The first meeting of the GoM took place at New Delhi on 4 Feb chaired by Health Minister Harsh Vardhan. In this meeting, a thorough review of preparations for prevention of coronavirus was made.

Relevant authorities made a presentation on the current situation of coronavirus before the GoM. Members were given updates about the three individuals infected with coronavirus in Kerala. Steps being taken to prevent the spread of coronavirus across the country were discussed.

The GoM was also informed about the two camps run by the Indo-Tibetan Border Force in Delhi and by the Indian Army at Gurugram near Delhi. 645 Indians have been kept in both these camps after they were brought safely to New Delhi from Wuhan province of China.

It was reported at the meeting that a total of 593 aircraft passengers coming from abroad had been tested so far. Thermal screening of 72,353 passengers has been undertaken. Thermal screening is now being done at 21 different airports of the country. As of 4 Feb, 2,815 aircraft passengers from different countries have been put on surveillance. Samples of 338 people have been sent for testing, of which 335 have been found completely safe.

The Union Health Ministry has appointed the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune as the nodal centre for testing coronavirus. Currently, samples of coronavirus are being tested at 12 different locations in the country, including Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad.

Notably, 361 people have died of coronavirus in China so far. At the same time, more than 17,000 people are suffering from this infection.

Arvind Krishna: IBMer joins elite Indian-origin CEOs club Indian-American Arvind Krishna, the newly-appointed CEO of the world's oldest technology company IBM, has joined the highprofile league of Indian-American honchos who are calling the shots at the $1-trillion strong companies in Silicon Valley.

Krishna, 57, joins Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, Alphabet and Google’s Sundar Pichai, Adobe’s Santanu Narayan and Mastercard's Ajay Banga in an elite Indian-origin CEO club.

Arvind Krishna will take over from longserving Virginia 'Ginni' Rometty upon her retirement.

Currently IBM's Senior Vice President for Cloud and Cognitive Software and principal architect of the company's acquisition of Red Hat, Krishna will also be a member of the Board of Directors, effective from 6 April.

An IBM veteran who joined the company 30 years back, Krishna did his schooling from Stanes Higher Secondary School in Bedford, Coonoor.

He earned his BE in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (1980-1985) and took a PhD in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

His current responsibilities also include IBM Security and Cognitive Applications business, and IBM Research.

Previously, he was general manager of IBM's Systems and Technology Group's development and manufacturing organisation, according to the company. Prior to that, Krishna built and led many of IBM's data-related businesses.

Last year, he led the largest acquisition in IBM's history - the $34 billion takeover of open source software giant Red Hat.

"Arvind is the right CEO for the next era at IBM,” 62-year-old Rometty said. “He is a brilliant technologist who has played a significant role in developing our key technologies such as artificial intelligence, cloud, quantum computing and blockchain."

"He is also a superb operational leader, able to win today while building the business of tomorrow. Arvind has grown IBM's Cloud and Cognitive Software business and led the largest acquisition in the company's history," she added.

"I am thrilled and humbled to be elected as the next Chief Executive Officer of IBM, and appreciate the confidence that Ginni and the Board have placed in me," said Krishna.

"I am looking forward to working with IBMers, Red Hatters and clients around the world at this unique time of fast-paced change in the IT industry," he added.

The company also announced that James Whitehurst, IBM Senior Vice President and CEO of Red Hat, will now be IBM President, effective April 6.

Nicknamed Big Blue, IBM is one of 30 companies included in the Dow Jones Industrial Average and one of the world's largest employers, with over 350,000 employees, known as IBMers.

At least 70 per cent of IBMers are based outside the US, the largest being India.

Meanwhile, Narayen, Banga and Nadella were among the top 10 best-performing chief executives in the world, according to the latest Harvard Business Review (HBR) list. While Narayen ranked 6th in the list of bestperforming 100 CEOs, Banga was placed at 7th position and Nadella at 9th.

Meanwhile, another India-origin technocrat has joined this elite CEO club. Co-sharing workspace company WeWork has named Indian-American real estate veteran Sandeep Mathrani as the new CEO of the company.

IIT Madras, UK researchers develop technology to make AI fairer

Researchers from Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT-Madras) and Queen's University Belfast in UK, have developed an innovative new algorithm to make Artificial Intelligence (AI) fairer and less biased when processing data.

Companies often use AI technologies to sift through huge amounts of data in situations such as an oversubscribed job vacancy or in policing when there is a large volume of CCTV data linked to a crime.

"AI techniques for exploratory data analysis, known as 'clustering algorithms', are often criticised as being biased in terms of 'sensitive attributes' such as race, gender, age, religion and country of origin," said study researcher Deepak Padmanabhan from Queen's University Belfast.

It has been reported that white-sounding names received 50 per cent more call-backs than those with black-sounding names.

Studies also suggest that call-back rates tend to fall substantially for workers in their 40s and beyond.

When a company is faced with a process that involves lots of data, it is impossible to manually sift through this.

Clustering is a common process to use in processes such as recruitment where there are thousands of applications submitted.

While this may cut back on time in terms of sifting through large numbers of applications, there is a big catch. It is often observed that this clustering process exacerbates workplace discrimination by producing clusters that are highly skewed.

Over the last few years 'fair clustering' techniques have been developed and these prevent bias in a single chosen attribute, such as gender.

The research team has now developed a method that, for the first time, can achieve fairness in many attributes.

"Fairness in AI techniques is of significance in developing countries such as India. These countries experience drastic social and economic disparities and these are reflected in the data," said Savitha Abraham from IIT Madras.

"Employing AI techniques directly on raw data results in biased insights, which influence public policy and this could amplify existing disparities. The uptake of fairer AI methods is critical, especially in the public sector, when it comes to such scenarios," Abraham added.

Our fair clustering algorithm, called 'FairKM,' can be invoked with any number of specified sensitive attributes, leading to a much fairer process, researchers said.

In a way, FairKM takes a significant step towards algorithms assuming the role of ensuring fairness in shortlisting, especially in terms of human resources.

FairKM can be applied across a number of data scenarios where AI is being used to aid decision making, such as pro-active policing for crime prevention and detection of suspicious activities.

The research work is scheduled to be presented in Copenhagen in April 2020 at the EDBT 2020 conference in Denmark.

Ola goes to London

Indian cab hailing major Ola has announced it will launch its operations in London on 10 Feb with over 20,000 registered drivers.

The ride hailing platform will be fully operational from day one, with its fleet of drivers having registered on the platform since it began onboarding a month ago.

“The overwhelmingly positive reception to Ola since launching in the UK in 2018 illustrates the significant demand from drivers, riders and communities. We are working closely with drivers to build a high quality and reliable service for Londoners,” Simon Smith, Head of Ola International, said in a statement.“Launching in London is a major milestone for us and we are keen to offer a first class experience for all our customers.”

The company aims to offer a differentiated experience on the platform with features such as 24×7 helplines for drivers and customers and an in-app emergency button, while providing the best quality of service through its large network of drivers across the city of London.

Ola’s passengers will benefit £25 worth of ride credit for signing up in the first week after the launch, the company added.

Ola, operating in the UK since 2018, obtained the licence to operate in London in 2019.The firm has expanded rapidly throughout the UK since its launch and will now operate across 28 local authorities. Cities including Birmingham, Coventry and Warwick have seen more than double-digit growth in rides in the last quarter. To date, Ola has provided over 3 million rides with more than 11,000 drivers already operating on the platform in the UK.

Jane and Kito de Boer's Indian art collection to be on Christie's NY

Items of Indian art from 'A Lasting Engagement: The Jane and Kito de Boer Collection' are set to go up on auction at Christie's South Asian Modern + Contemporary art sale in New York on 18 March 2020.

Numbering over 1,000 pieces, the collection is one of the largest and most varied collections of Indian art in private hands. It presents a survey of Indian painting from the late 19th century to the present day, covering major art movements, particularly the Bengal School, and includes significant works by Ganesh Pyne, Rameshwar Broota, Sayed Haider Raza, Francis Newton Souza, A. Ramachandran, Vasudeo S. Gaitonde, MaqboolFida Husain and K. Lama Goud among other artists. Living between London and Dubai, Kito De Boer and his wife Jane Gowers are two of the most well-known international collectors of Indian art.

They have put together a remarkable collection with a broad historical scope and wide range of artists.

The couple began collecting more than 25 years ago when they moved to New Delhi, and have continued their journey as patrons of Indian art and culture since then.

Describing how their interest in Indian art developed, Kito said,“We came from London in 1992 but it wasn't until we started living here that we were overwhelmed by the culture. It started off with visiting places like Hampi, where you get a sense of what an extraordinary civilization India is. We then started to discover Indian classical music, classical dances and of course the food which was the easiest to learn. Part of the culture was the visual culture, and that's when I suppose we chose to focus on art, because you can actually collect it and make the culture a part of yourselves. It was in the early days just one component of many, in terms of how do you engage with a society that is as dynamic, big and complicated as India as an outsider.”

Jane added,“The first work we bought is Bengali artist Ganesh Pyne from the Kumar gallery. I wanted to see more of his worksthere's a good one at the National Gallery of Modern Art in New Delhi, but beyond that it was tough to source more of his work. Back in the day there was no internet, you couldn't find pictures of art you were trying to collect… there may have been pamphlets with terrible quality. So I found out about who the collectors were of Pyne and then asked if I could visit their collections. The response was unanimously warm and positive.

People welcomed me with open arms and I went around looking at all these collections which was such a pleasure.”

Deepanjana Klein, International Head of Department for Contemporary Indian & Southeast Asian Art at Christie's, said of the collection, “It's an honour for us, the collection is so unique. As an auction house we see different kinds of collections - some have only trophy pieces, some speak and reek of great investments - people put together collections for various reasons. This collection is unique because it's got these few artists that they've collected in depth and you know it's all driven by the passion the two of them have for these artists.”

Two disused train coaches turned into classrooms in Mysuru

You’ve heard of fine-dining on trains, hospitals on trains, even exhibitions on trains. But have you ever come across a school holding classes in a train compartment?

Well, the Government Primary School in Ashokapuram Railway Colony within the Central Workshop in Mysuru has put creativity to good use to transform two disused coaches into classrooms, christened 'Nali Kali' in Kannada, which translates to 'joyful learning' in English.

South Western Railway Spokesperson E. Vijaya told IANS: "In Ashokapuram Colony, a government school was established in 1936 for students for Years 1 to 7 in three Type-II staff quarters. With the condition of staff quarters deteriorating over the years, two abandoned train coaches have since been refurbished and transformed into classrooms."

The refurbishment like wall panels, fans and lights - otherwise used in regular coaches - was undertaken voluntarily by the Mysore Central Workshop staff with a minimal expenditure of Rs 50,000 from the workshop account.

While one carriage serves as a classroom for children enrolled in two classes, the other serves as common place for lunch or other classroom activities.

"Both coaches have been re-painted in eyecatching colours, with alphabets and numerals painted on their exterior to inject an element of 'joy in learning' among the young minds," Vijaya said.

Bio-toilets have been installed outside the two coaches for students.

The school has 60 students in Years 1 to 7 on its rolls, mostly from families below the poverty line.

"We’re expecting the number of students to rise after the addition of two new classrooms," she said. “Next, we plan to reuse metal scrap from disused coaches to construct a roof over the entire premises."

In a similar project in another part of India, authorities in Madhya Pradesh's Dindori district had last year remodelled a government school to look like a train, in order to attract more students.

According to railway officials, since the district has tribal-dominated areas and no rail connectivity due to lack of development, a train is a sure-shot attraction among children.

Painted in shades of blue and yellow like iconic Indian trains,the doors and windows resemble those of train compartments. The school building's front portion was built to look like a train engine.

Interestingly, school teachers pooled their own money to build the unique building. Schools in Madurai, Chennai and Rajasthan have also undertaken similar projects to attract students.

Sabyasachi teams up with H&M for 'ready-to-wear' collection

Fashion brand H&M has announced its first global collaboration with the iconic Indian label Sabyasachi, to be launched on 16 April.

The Sabyasachi x H&M collaboration themed "Wanderlust" will present hand-crafted, eclectic travel pieces that will resonate with the modern global nomad wanting to add that "extra" to their wardrobe.

“I am happy to announce the collaboration with H&M, as it gives us the opportunity to spread the Sabyasachi aesthetic to a wider audience in India and worldwide,” Sabyasachi said in a statement. “Having done couture for the majority of my career, it is very exciting to bring that finesse of craft to 'ready-to-wear' and create whimsical and fluid silhouettes that bring relaxed sophistication to everyday life."

"At H&M, we are thrilled to announce our collaboration with iconic Indian designer Sabyasachi, known for his dynamic use of indigenous crafts and textiles - a language so stunning, that it permanently altered the fashion and design landscape of the country," added Ella Soccorsi, Concept Designer at Collaborations and Special collections, H&M.

The collection takes cues from India's rich textile, craft and history, and mixes modern and traditional silhouettes with a nod towards athleisure and glamping.

A key highlight of this collection will be Indian textile and print traditions brought to life by the Sabyasachi Art Foundation, meticulously crafted, embroidery and multicultural silhouettes.

The collection will offer a complete fashion wardrobe for both ladies and men, including accessories. The collection will be available in all H&M stores in India as well as selected H&M flagship stores around the world and online. IANS

SAISHA MEHROTRA

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