Tag Archives: #CoronaOutbreak

Business and Management, News

INVESTORS ARE WARMING UP TO A POSSIBLE JOE BIDEN VICTORY

Investors are preparing ahead for expected upcoming market turmoil ahead of the US presidential election in November, with some shifting stock portfolios and selling the dollar, as Democratic party contender Joe Biden maintains a considerable lead in opinion polls against President Donald Trump.

During the four months leading up to the Nov. 3 elections, much will shift, and several analysts are concentrated about how a coronavirus outbreak could threaten a fragile U.S. economic rebound.

Nonetheless, several fund investors are now planning for the prospect of a win for Biden by betting against the currency and slashing their stakes in US stocks.

“The president’s poll numbers have fallen off a cliff,” said Phil Orlando, chief equity market strategist at Federated Hermes. “The market is looking at this and saying, ‘If the election were held today Biden would win.'”

The new survey by Reuters / Ipsos shows Biden leading Trump among eligible voters by 8 percentage points. Trump’s support for treating the coronavirus pandemic has collapsed.

A win for Biden-as well as a potential House and Senate Democratic sweep-may challenge initiatives supported by Trump and widely preferred by Wall Street, including lower corporate tax levels and fewer restrictions, analysts said.

Despite the sharp coronavirus-fueled dip, since Trump took office, the S&P 500 is up about 37 per cent. Under the first term of Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, the index rose 85 per cent and 79 per cent respectively.

According to Amundi Pioneer Asset Management, under Biden, the corporate tax rate is expected to climb to 28 percent, replacing half of Trump’s and Republican-led Congress reduction in late 2017.

That could rising S&P 500 earnings by around $20 a share, push buyers out of U.S. stocks and damage the dollar, said Paresh Upadhyaya, fund manager at the firm that bets against the greenback.

The fund manager at Laffer Tengler Investments, Arthur Laffer Jr., unwounded his dollar stake last week, predicting that a Biden win could contribute to stronger development and strain on the U.S. currency. Laffer Jr ‘s father has been counseling Trump on economic concerns.

Gross betting in derivative contracts against the U.S. dollar just reached a two year peak.

In a report to clients, analysts at UBS Global Wealth Management said possible new legislation by a Democratic government may be a headwind for oil and financial stocks.

Recently, the BlackRock Investment Institute has cut its ratings on U.S. equities to neutral over concerns of fading fiscal stimulus and uncertainty about elections.

“The two parties are as far apart on policy as they have ever been, making the result consequential for markets,” BlackRock’s analysts said in a note.

Orlando of Federated Hermes has boosted his cash allowance as the cases of coronavirus have risen and the vote numbers of Trump have dropped. He expects to lower shares in dividend-paying securities if Trump’s fall in the polls tends to boost questions about higher dividend taxation and capital gains.

Most investors remain unconvinced that a Biden win or Democratic sweep will bode poorly for stocks, especially because the U.S. economy is supposed to be bolstered by the Federal Reserve if appropriate.

As long as (stimulus) stays constant … you will continue to have some ballast in terms of asset prices,” said Sam Hendel, president at Levin Easterly Partners.

Source:https://www.livemint.com/news/world/investors-are-waking-up-to-a-possible-joe-biden-victory-in-us-presidential-election-11593661949306.html

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Education

Medicines can cure diseases but only doctors can cure patients.

One of the most noble and respected profession on this Earth is of being a ‘Doctor’.A doctor is the only person who are given the stature next to God.A doctor dedicates his life to the service of the patients they provides relives to the service of man-kind.He cures the patients from disease and illness so that they could live a better and healthier life.In addition they are equipped with comprehensive knowledge and devices that enables them to diagnose and treat their patient with correct procedures.On 1st July every year in order to pay tribute to the doctors all around the World “International Doctors Day” is celebrated.A doctors life is very hard often they have to visit the patient at off hours foregoing his rest, sleep and even food.Even in this pandemic situation of “Castorphic Corona Outbreak” the doctors are working day and night so that they could stop the prevent of epidemic.Every now and then dangerous disease grab the humanity it’s the Doctor who finds the cure.It is because of Doctor a damaged organ can be transplanted in today’s medically advanced World.A doctor always treats his patient with smile and cheer they motivate and encourage sick person they act as a ray of hope in patients life.A Doctor pledges his life in alleviating the suffering of the patients.

News

US SUPPORTS INDIA’S BANNING OF CHINESE APPS

India’s ban on 59 Chinese applications, including the famous TikTok, has been widely noted in the US, including by some influential lawmakers, who have urged the US government to follow suit as the short video-sharing app is believed to pose a major security risk to the region.

India blocked 59 Chinese-linked apps Monday, including TikTok and UC Browser, saying they were harmful to the country’s sovereignty, dignity and security.

The prohibition, which comes against the context of India’s current stand-off with Chinese troops along the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh, is also relevant to WeChat and Bigo Live.

“India bans TikTok and dozens of other Chinese apps in the wake of the deadly clash,” powerful Republican Senator John Cornyn said in a tweet as he tagged a news report in The Washington Post.

Republican Congressman Rick Crawford tweeted that “TikTok must go and it should have been gone yesterday.”

Last week, US National Security Advisor, Robert O’Brien had alleged that the Chinese Government is using TikTok for its own purposes.

“On TikTok, a Chinese-owned social media platform with over 40 million American users, probably a lot of your kids, and younger colleagues, accounts criticising the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) and Beijing’s policies are routinely removed or deleted,” O’Brien said in his public remarks.

At least two proposals in the U.S. Senate are pending to prohibit federal government employees from using TikTok on their mobile phones, suggesting such a sentiment could build steam in the U.S. following the move by India.

“Would that be the same Chinese TikTok that was used to tank attendance at the Tulsa Rally?” tweeted Peter Navarro, Assistant to the US President for Trade and Manufacturing Policy, as he tagged a news report from The New York Times on India’s decision to ban these Chinese social media apps.

Fox News anchor Laura Ingraham urged the US to do the same. “LEADING THE WAY, WHERE’S THE U.S.? India bans dozens of Chinese apps including TikTok” she said in a tweet.

Author Gordon Chang said that India just banned 59 Chinese apps, including TikTok. “Why can’t the US do the same?” he asked.

According to Forbes, now with developers launching the latest clipboard alert in the beta edition of iOS 14, TikTok seems to have been caught abusing the clipboard in a rather remarkable manner.

“So it seems that TikTok didn’t stop this invasive practice back in April as promised after all,” it said.

An amendment added to the “Moving Forward Act” being considered this week in the US House of Representatives forbids Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers using the TikTok in smartphone device.

In April, Republican Senator Joshua David Hawley, passed a bill banning federal workers from accessing the TikTok social network camera platform on government-issued computers.

“This is a necessary step to protect the security of the US,” he said. A similar legislation has been introduced in the House of Representatives by Congressman Ken Buck.

“It (TikTok) is owned by a Chinese company that includes Chinese Community Party members in leadership and it is required under Chinese law to share user data with Beijing,” said Senator Hawley, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism, during a recent Congressional hearing.

“TikTok has admitted that it has sent user data to China. To put it bluntly, this is a major security risk for the American people,” Hawley said.

Source:https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/support-in-us-for-india-banning-tiktok-and-other-chinese-apps-11593585422772.html

Education, News

THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION IS HERE

Until recently, people at Lido Learning, a new educational startup company, would often be cut short by potential customers as soon as they heard “online tuitions.” Of the parents who did not hang up, only a quarter of the rest or one out of three would end up buying a subscription. By March, Lido Learning, whose educators gave math, science and English lessons on the internet to students from grade IV-IX in real time, had sold to students from grade IV-IX.

The organization increased its subscription revenue over the following three months.  Students are currently spending 90 minutes on an average on the network each day, which can be seen as a substantial increase as compared to max. an hour earlier. A  distribution team comprising of only 200 odd personnel  has made marketing much more efficient and smoother. Rather than illustrating the idea of online schooling to customers, what the organization wants to do now is show them how “we ‘re better than others,” said Sahil Sheth, CEO of Lido Education.

The company, Vedantu, the industry pioneer in K-12 live classes (kindergarten through grade XII), was hit by the influx of new students in early April, causing an unprecedented shortage of teaching assistants. The company’s teachers were now instructing 1,000 students instead of 300-400 students in each class. 1 million students attended live classes on Vedantu in May, up from 200,000 in usual times. Only a small fraction of these were paid users, but monthly revenues still jumped by more than three times from January, CEO Vamsi Krishna said. “What was happening in a year’s time in terms of growth happened in three months’ time,” he said.

The pandemic-driven growth of online education has been so broad that it’s tough to locate an educational company that hasn’t taken a parallel route. From industry giants to smaller companies, investors are quite optimistic this is the sector’s defining moment.

In India, education has always had a quasi-religious significance, as a degree is seen as the only means of prosperity. With schools and colleges shut down, disarray entrance exam schedules, inaccessible offline classes, parents and students are even more concerned about the future than usual, prompting them to try online tuitions like never before.

“Usually, when a new category is being created, companies have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising over 8-10 years to get customers to shift from offline to online. In the case of edtech, this is happening super-fast because of the lockdown and because all the schools have gone online,” Lido Learning’s Sheth said.

The online education industry continues to be split into two categories by founders and investors: K-12 and post K-12. Both divisions, which in effect have several different verticals, had evolved rapidly anyway. The growth has been massively exacerbated by the pandemic. By 2022, the K-12 industry would grow by six times to approximately $ 1.7 billion, while the post K-12 sector would rise by nearly four times to $1.8 billion, RedSeer Consultancy predicts.

On the other side, funds are lined up to obtain shares in start-ups in healthcare. Byju’s, Unacademy and Vedantu, three prominent startups in education, are all raising large amounts of capital at soaring valuations. Over a dozen smaller startups, including Lido Learning and WhiteHat Jr, are in talks to raise between $5-50 million to anywhere.

Source:https://www.livemint.com/education/news/the-hope-and-hype-driving-online-education-11593433643546.html

Law and Order, Public Administration

DELHI’S RISING NO. NOT PERMANENT

As predicted, on Wednesday Delhi overtook Mumbai to become the region with the country’s largest number of novel Coronavirus cases. Delhi now has over 70,000 cases, of which roughly 40,000 have been detected during the last two weeks. These are around 800 fewer Mumbai has.

Yet it’s doubtful this condition will remain permanent. Delhi’s surge can be attributed to a marked increase in the number of samples tested by the city late, particularly after deploying the recently approved rapid antigen tests, which yield results in just about half an hour. The number of tests in Delhi has risen from around five to seven thousand a day in the last ten days to close to 20,000 on Wednesday.

On the other side, Mumbai performed very small experiments, between 4,000 and 4,500 a day. But Mumbai too, having ordered one lakh fast antigen kits, is now all set for an increased check. Mumbai ‘s case numbers are also expected to go up when these experiments continue to be implemented. There is already some criticism that Mumbai has spread its test net quite thinly, targeting only the primary contacts of the infected and those at the highest risk of infection. The real number of cases in Mumbai may be much higher, but since the results are small, this is not being observed.

Meanwhile, Delhi has also decided to carry out door-to – door monitoring to detect the disease early and minimize the spread. Mumbai has been doing this exercise on a smaller scale for some time, and he’s had some success. Door-to – door screening results in early identification of suspected outbreaks, thus reducing the number of individuals to which the virus can be spread. This exercise could theoretically halt or delay the growth of Delhi events.

Door-to – door surveillance is now expected in Madhya Pradesh as well as starting July 1. The test is part of a fortnight-long program to step up measures to curb the virus’ spread. The disease has also accelerated dramatically in the state. Indeed, Madhya Pradesh is the slowest growing country among major states, with growth rates below 2%.

One city which was lauded for its efforts to monitor the spread of the virus until quite recently is Bengaluru. It had succeeded in avoiding the fate of Delhi , Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Chennai , Hyderabad, Pune or Kolkata. Over the last few days, though, the situation has improved somewhat, but it is better than the other big cities. More than 1,000 new cases have been identified this month in the region, while about 70 people have died. Local officials are now considering a partial shutdown to curb the rise.

In Chandigarh, a weekend shutdown is also being considered, but it is more to do with people who do not follow basic laws of physical distance than any big surge in cases. Chandigarh has only 420 confirmed illnesses, many of which didn’t meet physical distancing rules. Nevertheless, merchants and shopkeepers have resisted any attempt to enforce a weekend lockout. Punjab also follows the pattern of lockout at the weekend.

On Wednesday about 17,000 new cases were reported across the country bringing the overall number of infections above 4.7 lakh, of which about 2.6 lakh have recovered. Close to 15,000 people have died in India so far because of the disease.

Source:https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/india-coronavirus-cases-explained-delhi-mumbai-covid-cases-deaths-6475436/

Law and Order, Public Administration

‘LEARN FROM HISTORY’ SAYS DONALD TRUMP

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As America comes face to face with it’s racism in its past, President Donald Trump has firmly back lined up with those who argue that the pendulum has swung too far in favor of removing statues and other symbols of that flawed history, saying errors will be repeated unless learned from and understood.

Trump’s campaign also sees the division over this new political flash point as a way to improve the president’s reputation, which has weakened through his treatment of the coronavirus epidemic and the social discrimination demonstrations that accompanied the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. After weeks spent demanding “law and order” in response to the protests sparked by Floyd’s death by police, Trump began to draw a line in the sand.

He vowed executive action to preserve landmarks after several Confederate statues and other historical icons with checkered life stories were violently pulled down from parks and other socially popular spots.

Trump says he wanted the highest penalty possible under federal law — up to a decade in prison — for anyone who wrecks or tamper with public property monuments commemorating those who served in the U.S. military. He said the executive order would “strengthen” existing legislation.

“We are looking at long-term jail sentences for these vandals and these hoodlums and these anarchists and agitators,” Trump said, referring to protesters who have vented their anger over racial injustice by toppling statues of figures tied to America’s racist history.

He spoke out after an attempt Monday night to bring down a Lafayette Park statue of Andrew Jackson, one of Trump’s favorite presidents, was foiled by police in the park across from the White House. Trump called it a “sneak attack” on the statue of Jackson, who owned slaves and was ruthless in his treatment of Native Americans. “We should learn from the history,” he told Fox News in a taped interview broadcast Tuesday. “And if you don’t understand your history, you will go back to it again.”

Trump’s campaign sees the attempts to remove statues as a potential presidential lifeline. The campaign argues that liberals are dramatically overreaching by embracing calls to “defund the police” and remove statues of American icons taught in history books.

In the current climate, Trump’s prior support of Confederate statues and military bases named after such individuals posed a political risk. But aides now believe the president has found an unexpected new line of attack on Democrats as the effort to remove symbols has spread to include the likes of Presidents Ulysses S. Grant, Jackson and George Washington in some places.

Although all three figures were flawed individuals, Trump’s campaign believes he can use them to wage a culture war and position the president as the defender of a way of life threatened by demographic change and generational shifts in views on issues ranging from marriage to racial justice.

Calls to overhaul policing and confront lingering racial inequality may be bipartisan, but Trump’s reelection team believes the most aggressive steps being pushed by some Democrats will turn off centrists and energize the president ‘s base-– many of whom share his avowed commitment to safeguard symbols of the nation’s past. A White House official and a campaign assistant summarized the president’s rationale by speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to publicly discuss the issue.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday cast the “lawlessness” of the attacks on statues as a cultural phenomenon among “far-left radicals” in need of a history lesson.

Source:https://indianexpress.com/article/world/trump-says-learn-from-history-instead-of-removing-statues-6473595/

Business and Management, Law and Order

Will US pause on H1-B visas will impact Indian companies?

On Tuesday, the U.S. government announced it extended the 60-day immigration and non-immigrant worker visa ban until the end of 2020. Popular work visas including the much coveted H-1B and H-2B and some categories of H-4, J and L visas will also remain suspended until 31 December, the White House said in a press release.

The move, said US President Donald Trump, was to protect domestic workers who had been affected in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic because of a contraction in the economy.

To fill a shortage with highly qualified low-cost workers in IT and other similar fields, the U.S. government issues a variety with permits per year allowing businesses outside the U.S. to send staff to work on customers.

Among all working visas, the H-1B remains the most common among IT companies in India. Per year, the US government has a quota of 85,000 H-1B total visas. Of this, 65,000 H-1B visas are issued to highly skilled foreign workers, while the remaining 20,000 may be allocated additionally to highly skilled foreign workers who have an American university degree in higher education or master’s.

In addition to the H-1B visas, the US government also issues L1 visas allowing companies to transfer highly skilled workers to the US for up to seven years. H-2B visas enable food and farm workers to seek employment in the US.

After its introduction in 1952, the H-1 visa system has undergone several modifications and amendments to authorize or disallow other groups of foreign workers in the US, depending on the country’s economic situation.

Together with the arrival of the internet and low-cost computers in developing countries such as India and China, the technology boom saw a large number of graduates willing to work at relatively low costs in the US, a win-win situation for both the employer and the staff. Since then, though, it has been frequently criticized for sending low-cost workers to the US at the expense of homeworkers.

After taking over as US president in January 2017, Trump had suggested that low-cost workers hampered the economy and undermined citizens’ jobs. The US then suggested that the “broken” H-1B visa system be reformed.

Trump seized the opportunity presented by Covid-19’s economic contraction by first banning the entry of non-immigrant workers until June 23, and then extending it until December 31.

Trump said in his executive order extending the ban that while “properly administered temporary worker programs can bring benefits to the economy” under normal circumstances, the extraordinary economic contraction created as a result of Covid-19 posed a threat to American workers.

As the ban is in place immediately, issuance of the additional types of visas H-1B, H-2B, J, and L will have to be halted. This means that those who do not have a valid non-immigrant visa as of June 23, and who are outside the US, will not be allowed to enter the country until December 31. Some relief has been given to workers in essential services in the food sector and their entry will be decided by the immigration services consular officer.

Source:https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/us-h1b-visa-suspension-india-it-companies-6471966/

Education

What we know about the financial crises is that we don’t know much.

Financial crisis is any broad variety of situations in which some financial assets suddenly loose a large part of their nominal value these situations are interlinked with the stock market crashes and the bursting of the other financial bubbles, currency crisis and sovereign defaults.In the 19th and early 20th century,many financial crises were associated with banking panics,and many recession coincided with these. Financial crises directly results in loss of paper wealth.The World major economies are currently affected by the pandemic this is a crisis like no other, and there is substantial uncertainty about its impact on other and people’s lives and livelihoods. A lot depends upon the epidemiology of the virus , the effectiveness of the containment measures and the development of the vaccine which is hard to predict.The corona virus recession or the great shut down has which rose an economic consequence.The first major sign of the corona virus was the 2020 clash stock market clash and the International monetary fund (IMF) reported that all of the G7 nations has already entered or entering the “deep recession” and that had already lead to slowdown of the emerging economies.The recession had led to unemployment Worldwide and the recession saw the collapse of the price of oil triggered by the price war.During the crash, global stock market made unpredictable and volatile swings mainly due to extreme uncertainty in markets.

Business and Management, Science and Technology

RESTRICTIONS ON UBER REMOVED

A Colombian court reversed an order that required ride-hailing company Uber to temporarily halt it’s activities in the country last year and to change the company’s service delivery model.

The Industry and Commerce Superintendency (SIC), which regulates fair competition and protects consumers, said Uber had violated the rules of competition in a taxi company lawsuit in December. In February Uber resumed transporting passengers with a new model of service that allows users to rent cars with drivers.

But in a decision dated Thursday, the Superior Tribunal of Bogota said the time limit for the taxi company to present its complaint had expired.

The SIC has repeatedly fined technology companies like Uber and Rappi this can mainly be attributed to the lack of regulatory framework for delivery and ride-hailing apps. DiDi and Cabify also operate in the country.

“It must be remembered that the situation of digital platforms in regards to the provision of these types of services is a regulatory issue that must be resolved via laws,” the head of the SIC Andres Barreto .

After recently announcing salary cuts and layoffs for its workers, Uber has furloughed hundreds of its employees in India, as coronavirus is chewing up sales. The company has announced that it will no longer operate with 600 workers in its Indian business, as the company is looking to slash expenses in the wake of a pandemic. The figure is 25 per cent of Uber ‘s total nation workers, Uber said Tuesday in a tweet. The announcements made by Uber follow an earlier statement made by its local competitor Ola, which had laid off 1,400 employees or around one in every third employee.

 “Around 600 full time positions across driver and rider support, as well as other functions, are being impacted. These reductions are part of previously announced global job cuts this month,” Pradeep Parameswaran, President for Uber’s India and South Asia businesses, said.

Job cuts were implemented through out various departments from client and driver service, corporate growth, compliance, regulation, communications, and finance. As part of the company ‘s corporate turnaround program, Uber has retrenched about 6,700 employees this month. The American multinational ride hailing company said it gave the laid off workers 10 to 12 weeks of pay. Uber has provided them with medical benefits over the next six months.

“The impact of Covid-19 and the unpredictable nature of the recovery has left Uber India with no choice but to reduce the size of its workforce. Today is an incredibly sad day for colleagues leaving the Uber family and all of us,” the statement said.

But with easing lockdowns the company said on Wednesday trip requests were gradually picking up, but still remained significantly below prior year levels, as several countries start to lift coronavirus-led restrictions.

Trip requests are now down about 70% from a year earlier, slightly lesser than April’s 80% drop, Chief Executive Officer Dara Khosrowshahi said in a conference with Bank of America analysts. He said the company’s rides business is improving on a week-over-week basis, adding that the surge in food-delivery orders at Uber Eats recorded in the first quarter, showed no signs of slowing in May, easing concerns of investors who thought it could be a one-off trend during the pandemic.

Source: 1.https://in.reuters.com/article/uber-colombia/colombia-court-overturns-restriction-on-uber-idINKBN23R0DQ?il=0

2.https://www.financialexpress.com/industry/sme/uber-lay-offs-coronavirus-lockdown-startups-uber-india-staff-fired-industry-salary-cuts-job-loss-uber/1970594/

3.https://www.deccanherald.com/business/uber-signals-recovery-in-rides-as-coronavirus-lockdown-restrictions-ease-845468.html

Research Paper

“corona DEVI”

Woman worshipping “Corona Devi”

COVID-19 : Corona virus is believed to be originated from China’s Wuhan city has left the world in serious condition. Many countries are suffering with the spike of cases.

After India’s cases tally rises, parts of rural areas has started worshipping ‘Corona Devi’ . Suddenly corona virus converted into ‘corona devi ‘ Goddess in hope that this will protect them from covid-19 infection.

Corona Goddess is being worshiped in parts of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and Assam. In Uttar Pradesh, women in some villages in Kushinagar district and in many districts of Bihar, including Nalanda, Gopalganj, Saran, Muzaffarpur superstition run deep.

These women have dug a small pit in the field, filled it with water and each one offers nine cloves and nine ‘ladoos’ to ‘Corona Mai’ to appease her. Women from adjoining villages are flocking to the ‘temple’ to pray to ‘Corona Mai’. The women, though, are seen maintaining social distancing. Chants of “jai Corona mai” and “Corona mata ki jai” echoed in some open fields. A group of women took a dip in the Ganga and offered prayers at the river bank. Seven pits were made and after lighting incense, jaggery and sesame along with ‘ladoos’ and flowers were buried into the ground.

In many areas, the worship is also done by offering ‘poha’ to the ‘Corona Devi’.

According to the village in Dhanbad, women said that Corona Mai, who had come in dreams in the form of a cow and gradually turned into a lady saying that if people in India would start worshipping her, she will go from where she has come. Therefore, villagers performed puja here today to ward off corona virus from this country. Some said, viral videos and messages forced them to worship to get rid off corona.

Some local people have appealed to the district administration to stop such activities which spread superstition and misinformation and also such activities marks a spot for risk of pandemic.

Videos of women performing puja have gone viral on social media. Twitter flooded with #CoronaMai and in many villages of Bihar, women have resorted to worshipping what they call #CoronaDevi, a perceived angry goddess who shall turn benevolent if prayers are offered. People can’t believe that people have come up with such a superstition in the time when the entire world is fighting against the pandemic. While scientists and doctors are struggling to invent Corona virus vaccine.

Amid the lockdown, these kinds of superstitions, misinformation, viral material are very dangerous which creates negative awareness among people.