Trade and Industry Minister Chan Chun Sing said on Saturday (9 Nov) that the Singapore-India Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) does not grant Indian nationals unconditional access into Singapore or immigration privileges (‘CECA does not grant Indian nationals unconditional access, immigration privileges: Chan Chun Sing‘). Claims that the bilateral agreement has cost job opportunities for Singaporeans aim to stoke fears …

It was reported in the media today that Ministry of Manpower and Immigration and Checkpoint Authority, have both found nothing wrong with the education documents, Erramalli Ramesh had submitted for his citizenship application (‘Authorities checked educational qualifications of $1.5 million condo man and found nothing amiss‘, 9 Nov). In a joint reply to the media, both government agencies said that …

At the ASEAN summit in Bangkok on Monday (4 Nov), India announced that it will opt out of the RCEP (Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership) Agreement. Indian PM Narendra Modi said that India was dropping out of the agreement, citing its negative effects on India. “The present form of the RCEP Agreement does not fully reflect the basic spirit and the …

In an opinion piece on Yahoo yesterday (‘COMMENT: Heng Swee Keat needs to raise his game against Workers’ Party‘, 6 Nov), Yahoo’s Assistant News Editor Nicholas Yong observed that Heng had scored his own goal at the latest sitting of Parliament on Tuesday (5 Nov). “Fumbled. Dropped the ball. Whichever sporting analogy you prefer, Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat …

At a forum organised by interfaith organisation Roses of Peace, National University of Singapore (NUS) and Straits Times on Sunday (3 Nov), panelists urged the silent majority to “call out” racist comments posted online. The forum which was held in NUS was supported by OnePeople.sg, a national body chaired by Dr Puthucheary, the Senior Minister of State of the Communications …

At the 35th ASEAN Business and Investment summit last Saturday (2 Nov), negotiators were still discussing to create the world’s largest regional trade pact, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), after India made more last-minute requests, Bloomberg reported. The RCEP is a proposed free trade agreement (FTA) between the ten member states of the ASEAN (Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, …

DBS Bank India Limited, the wholly owned subsidiary of DBS Bank has announced “good” financial results recently for its fiscal year ending 31 Mar 2019. The net profit of DBS Bank India stood at INR 14.5 crore (S$2.8 million) against a loss of INR 533 crore (S$102 million) in FY2017-18. Total deposits was reported to have increased by 15.76% to …

The Amaravati capital project was formally scrapped by the new Andhra Pradesh government on Wednesday (30 Oct), terminating the agreement with the Singapore consortium consisting of Temasek-linked companies. The Singapore consortium had been involved in the Amaravati project since the beginning of 2014. Surbana Jurong submitted the city’s masterplan in 2015, and a consortium of Ascendas-Singbridge (now under CapitaLand) and …

SPH has just published its latest annual report for the financial year ending August 2019. It its report, SPH revealed that the total print and digital circulation of its flagship newspaper Straits Times (ST) increased 4.2% from 370,000 to 386,100. This total increase of 4.2% reversed the trend of its last three years’ figures of -18.4% (2016), -2.5% (2017) and …

A member of the public Jason Goh Yew Choon wrote to ST Forum on Tuesday (29 Oct), questioning why the grassroots organisations at Tanjong Pagar GRC and Radin Mas SMC chose to celebrate Halloween instead of Deepavali, which is a Singapore’s festival celebrated on Sunday (27 Oct) this year (‘Forum: Community event could have focused on Deepavali instead‘). “Tanjong Pagar …