Quick notes: Dhanteras | Demographic dividend...

• Putin-Modi parity? India brings back gold from London. Some day, the west may find an excuse to freeze Indian reserves like they did to Russia.



• Here you go: US sanctions 15 Indian entities for backing Russia



• Violating US export laws: Indian drugmaker exported Nvidia AI chips to Russia.



• Maintaining the demographic dividend: Chandrababu Naidu mulling new election law to boost population in Andhra
  
  Demographic crisis: South Korea sets world record with fertility rate dropping to new low
  
  'Uday' and 'Nidhi' are Sanskrit: Stalin asks parents to give Tamil names to children



• Bharat Karnad: This Chinese advantage is only because New Delhi is not willing to play the game by the rules of strict reciprocity.
  
  China has had to pay no price in terms of, say, losing its access to the Indian market that the Indian govt generously affords it. Nor has Delhi insisted that Chinese tech companies, in particular, wishing to do business here, establish joint ventures and be required by law to transfer all the technology of the products they sell to the Indian people, to their Indian partners, and to manufacture every small sub-component and widget that goes into their products in India itself. Or, to get the hell out, and stay out! These are conditions, by the way, China insists on for any foreign company, including Indian firms operating in China.
  
  But no, the Indian govt has no such set of pre-conditions. The result: a humungous trade imbalance — just in the first six months of 2024, the trade deficit grew to $42 billion — the highest it has ever been! Meaning $42 billion of India’s wealth has been shifted to the Chinese khazana!



• Basically poison: How Canada convinced the world to eat engine lubricant... Canola oil is repurposed motor oil, not edible.




• Displacing software engineers? Google now uses AI to write 25% of its new code



• Woke Mecca: Donations to Harvard’s Endowment Drop by More Than $150 Million



• AI BS: Linus Torvalds reckons AI is ‘90% marketing and 10% reality’
  
  - Baidu CEO warns AI is just an inevitable bubble.
  
  - Marc Benioff blames Microsoft for overhyping AI.
  
  - Son-in-law Zuck's gift: Chinese researchers develop AI model for military use on back of Meta's Llama
  
  - Social media platforms using your data to generate AI models. How to opt out



• Amazon goes nuclear, to invest more than $500 million to develop small modular reactors
  
  - Google will help build seven nuclear reactors to power its AI systems