The Trio Padma award winners of 2022 from Andhra Pradesh

On 22^nd March, 2022 AP Bhavan and AP Government has felicitated three Padma award winners from the state of Andhra Pradesh Mr. Garikapati Narasimha Rao, Dr Sunkara Venkata Adinarayana Rao
  and  Late Gosaveedu Shaik Hasan (represented by his grandson).   I attended the program – first in the last two years since outbreak of pandemic.   All three awardees well deserve the Padma award and brought respect and dignity to the award conferred on them.

                                                                                                                

Garikapati Narasimha Rao – conferred Padmasri in Literary & Education category

Garikipati Narasimha Rao, 62 years, a renowned Avadhani and religious Pravachana karta (discourser) is the most popular and recognisable person among the three awardees and got Padmasri under `Literature and Education’ category.   Garikapati has become a household name for his discourses on Hindu religion/epic and personality development.    He has great sense of humour and mixes contemporary issues with his religious discourses of epics like Ramayan, Mahabharat, Bhagavatam etc., which made him popular among youth also and motivated them to go back to their religious roots.     Garikapati’s discourses are broadcast on radio, telecast on prominent Telugu channels, receive millions of views on YouTube and are circulated on Whatsapp group.

What sets Garikapati apart from others is his ability to do Astavadhanam (with eight Pruchakas) / Satavadhanam (with hundred Pruchakas) / Sahasravadhanam (with thousand Pruchakas).   While doing the Avadhanam, The Avadhani spins out verses confirming to the Telugu grammer on literally any subject under the Sun which Pruchakas (who themselves are literary scholars) throw at him as challenge.   The most challenging part of the `Avadhanam’ is at the end of completing the entire process he has to recite back all the verses he made for 8 to 21 days as the cases may be at one go without any help of notes/computers.    For doing such a tough task one need to have a super computer like brain apart from having literary competency. Garikipati has successfully done 288 Avadhanams including a 21 days long Sahasravadhanam with 1116 Pruchakas in 1996 which found a place in Guinness world record books.   The process of Avadhanam is done only in Telugu language and Garikipati is one of the very few with ability to do Avadhanam - a dying art.  

For over the last one decade I listen to his Pravachan daily in the morning during my walk.   For the first time i could listen to him live delivering fantastic discourse on Gita for one hour non stop.   Happy that the audi was packed to the brim and he was accorded a rousing reception like a film star.  

 

Dr  Sankara Adinarayana Rao – conferred Padmasri in Medcine category

                                                                                              

Dr Adinarayana Rao, 82 years, is a well known Orthopaedic Surgeon who served thousands of polio patients.   Born in Bhimavaram of West Godavari,  Dr. Adinarayana Rao completed his MBBS as well as PG from Andhra Medical College, Visakhapatnam.   He is also trained in micro-vascular and hand surgery in Germany. He served as a professor of Traumatology and Orthopaedics in the Andhra University. Later, he worked as a Civil Surgeon in the King George Hospital, Visakhapatnam. Apart from this, he has also presented many research papers in various state and national level conferences and seminars, and authored two books, Surgery on Polio Disability and Principles and Practices of Orthopaedics.

In an illustrious career of six decades, Dr. Adinarayana Rao has rendered his services to the poor and needy. He has successfully completed over one lakh surgeries till date.  Dr. Adinarayana Rao had previously received the National Award  from the Prime Minister of India, for his welfare work for the disabled  in 1988 and also received the National Award for Child Welfare from the President of India in 2014.  He is currently managing trustees of Free Polio Surgical & Research Foundation and director general of Prema Group of Hospitals and Institutions.

Gosaveedu Shaik Hassan, - Conferred Padmasri  posthumously in Art Category

                                                                                                  

Ghaik Hassan was an exponent of Nadaswaram, a traditional piped classical instrument of South India.   He was the symbol of India’s great secular tradition and was `Astana Vidvaan’ and performed in Seeta Rama temple in Bhandrachalam for 46 years from 1950 to 1996.  

Shaik Hassan is the only person from the Telugu states to perform in all the famous temples of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana through government orders.   He performed at TTD Sri Venkateswara Temple, Kanakadurga Temple at Vijayawada, Srikalahasti, Mallikarjuna Swamy Temple, Ahobilam, Simhachalam, Vemulawada, Annavaram and many more temples.     Shaik Hassan has performed for nearly seven decades continuously in the Annual Tyagaraja Aradhan festival in Tanjayur district of TN.  He was honoured with gold bracelet by the organisers in 1962 and Thyagaraja Puraskar Award in 2007

Shaik Hassan learned instrumental music from renewed  musician Sheik Chinna Moulana and vocal music from  M Balamurali Krishna’s father Mangalampalli Pattabhiramaiah.   Hassan was a freedom fighter.     He worked with All India Radio, Delhi, Hyderabad and  Vijayawada,

Shaiek Hassan died at the age of 93 years old in June, 2021 and did not live to receive Padma Sri personally.  

 

S. Prabhakar

23.3.22

 

Investing in US stock in India by Indian Investors

by S. Prabhakar

                                                                                                                 
         National Stock Exchange's (NSE) International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) platform in Gujarat's Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT City) has started trading in eight US stocks from  3rd March, 2022.

 

Investing in foreign stocks helps investors to diversify their portfolios and increase their investment horizon and overcome the limitation of being bogged down by the Indian stock markets falling for long time at any point of time.    Historically the foreign stocks are less volatile and also give higher returns compared to Indian markets. 

 

Hitherto to invest in US stocks Investors have to undergo very cumbersome and costly process.    One need to open an International trading account, have a US bank account.   Get Indian rupees converted into US Dollars by complying with RBI guidelines before buying US stocks. 

 

NSE International Exchange

 

NSE IFSC Limited (NSE International Exchange) is a fully owned subsidiary company of National Stock Exchange of India Limited (NSE) which has established an international Exchange in Gujarat International Finance Tech City (GIFT) - International Financial Service Centre (IFSC) Gandhinagar to grow the financial market.

 

Stock exchanges operating in the GIFT IFSC are permitted to offer trading in securities in any currency other than the Indian rupee.

Trading is permitted inter-alia in equity shares of companies incorporated outside of India by Indian Investors.

 

NSE IFSC Receipt

Trading in the stocks will be in the form of Unsponsored Depository Receipts.

The receipts are like depository receipts and with the help of these receipts the investor can invest in fractional quantity of the underlying shares and these Receipts can be held in their GIFT city demat accounts.   The fraction receipts are issued as a ratio of the underlying shares.    For example, one share of Apple will be equivalent to 100 NSE IFSC receipts and one share of Amazon will be equivalent to 200 NSE IFSC receipts each.  The rights of holders of these receipts are at par with the holders of the shares in respect of their right to dividend and other corporate actions.   This is a huge advantage to average Indian investors as they will be able to invest in the shares of blue chip US stocks with small amount of capital.   Investor can get started by investing as little as $0.01 but every share will have its own limit.   In Indian markets an investor has to invest in minimum 1 share and multiples thereof but no fractions are allowed.   This route makes the entire process of international investment easy and at a low cost for Indian retail investors

Trading, clearing, settlement and holding of US stocks will be under the regulatory structure of IFSC Authority.

Will the investor become a Member of the company?

The investor holds receipts and hence will not become member / an equity owner of these US companies, but the investor will be entitled to corporate action benefits, like dividends etc.

How many shares are permitted to be traded?

NSE IFSC has got approval to trade in 50 US shares but on 3nd March, 2022 only eight shares out of this 50 will be made available for trading which will gradually increased to 50.   The much sought after Miscrosoft, Nexflex, Apple, Walmart, Telsa, Amazon, Alphabet and Metaplatforms can be traded.   

Opening Account with IFSCA Trading Members

An investor who wants in invest in US shares, need to open a Trading and  demat account with IFSC Registered trading members after completing all KYC requirements and Liberalised Remittance Scheme with the bank where investor has account.    There are 36 such brokers now, and include most of the large broking houses in India.  Before trading an Investor need to transfer the required amount from his bank account to trading member’s bank account.   Though the trading currency will be US dollars, it is optional for the Investor either to have a US dollar account with a bank in IFSC area or can remit and receive the amount from their domestic INR account.

As per RBI guidelines the maximum limit under Liberalised Remittance Scheme is US $ 2,50,000 per person per financial year upto which an investor can invest

Taxing of gains

Capital gains made on sale of receipts held for less than two years will be considered as short-term capital gains and be taxed according to the tax slabs applicable to the individual.

For holdings of more than two years, provisions of long-term capital gains will be applicable and the tax rate will be 20%, with the benefit of indexation.

Trading days and hours

The holidays will be as per the US trading holiday and in addition few Indian holidays are also observed as trading holidays.     The trading hours will be from 8:30 pm to 2:30 am next day and this duration falling on two days as per IST will be treated as a single business day.

S. Prabhakar

4.3.2022