Latest news with #Sami
Mint
7 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Mint
Adnan Sami slams Mumbai airport's Pranam service: ‘Inefficient, careless, lazy'
Singer Adnan Sami criticised the Pranaam meet-and-greet service at Mumbai's airport on Saturday. He took to his X (formerly Twitter) account and alleged that the service was 'Inefficient, careless, lazy' and tagged the official account of Mumbai Airport. 'Pranaam service at Mumbai airport has become the most inefficient, careless & lazy as hell service in all of India! They couldn't care a damn for their clients!! Awful!! So many horrible experiences. Shameful," the singer wrote. He further urged Mumbai airport authorities to take a look and rectify. '@CSMIA_Official needs to take serious note & pull Pranaam's socks up – LIKE A LOT," he also said. Soon after he shared the post, Mumbai Airport responded to his complaint. Their reply read, 'Dear Mr Sami, thank you for writing to us. We are really concerned to hear this. We take your feedback very seriously and have communicated it to the concerned team for their attention. The comfort, safety and well-being of our passengers is our topmost priority. – Team CSMIA." However, the singer wasn't satisfied with the automated reply. 'Nothing more insulting than a 'Standard Template Bot Reply' which ultimately means nothing," Adnan Sami further shared. For the unversed, the Pranaam Meet and Greet Service is designed to improve the airport experience. It offers travellers services such as fast-track immigration, one-on-one assistance, airside greeting by a CIP agent, porter service, buggy transportation, VIP terminal transfers, lounge access, hostess greeting, aircraft transfers, and handling of customs formalities at the VIP lounge. However, Adnan Sami did not disclose the details of his experience or what went wrong when tried to avail of the services. Adnan Sami Khan is one of the most popular musicians, known for his versatile ability to perform across genres and languages, including Hindi, Urdu, English, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, and Malayalam. He was honoured with the Padma Shri for his remarkable contributions to the world of music. Renowned for his piano skills, Adnan was the first artist to infuse Indian classical elements and the santoor into piano compositions. His talent earned him global recognition, with the US-based Keyboard magazine crowning him as the fastest keyboard player in the world. They named him the "keyboard discovery" of the 1990s.
Time of India
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Adnan Sami criticizes Mumbai airport's Pranaam Meet-and-Greet Service, calls it ‘shameful'
Singer Adnan Sami criticized Mumbai airport's Pranaam meet-and-greet service as inefficient and careless on X, urging officials to improve it. Mumbai airport responded, assuring action, but Sami dismissed their reply as a generic message. The service offers VIP assistance, though Sami didn't specify his exact complaints. Today, singer Adnan Sami took to X (formerly Twitter) to express his frustration with the Pranaam meet-and-greet service at Mumbai airport. He described the service as inefficient, disorganized, and lacking care, mentioning that he has experienced repeated issues with them over time. Sami's Angry Note He wrote, 'Pranaam service at Mumbai airport has become the most inefficient, careless & lazy as hell service in all of India! They couldn't care a damn for their clients!! Awful!! So many horrible experiences. Shameful". Call for Action to Mumbai Airport Officials Sami called on the Mumbai airport officials to address the ongoing issues with the Pranaam meet-and-greet service. He emphasized the need for immediate improvement, stating, '@CSMIA_Official needs to take serious note & pull Pranaam's socks up – LIKE A LOT". Mumbai Airport's Official Response In response to Sami's complaint, Airport's official Twitter account assured him of their concern. They stated, 'Dear Mr Sami, thank you for writing to us. We are really concerned to hear this. We take your feedback very seriously and have communicated it to the concerned team for their attention. The comfort, safety and well-being of our passengers is our topmost priority. – Team CSMIA." Sami's Reaction to the Airport's Reply However, the singer hit back, saying, 'Nothing more insulting than a 'Standard Template Bot Reply' which ultimately means nothing." What is Pranaam Meet and Greet Service? For those who don't know, Pranaam Meet and Greet Service is designed to simplify airport experiences for travelers. It offers assistance with navigating the terminal, managing luggage, and delivering VIP-style services to ensure a hassle-free and comfortable journey. Lack of Specific Details from Adnan Sami However, Adnan did not provide specific details about the incidents or reasons behind his dissatisfaction with the service. About Adnan Sami Adnan Sami Khan is an accomplished artist who seamlessly blends Indian and Western musical styles, performing in languages such as Hindi, Urdu, English, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, and Malayalam. Honored with the Padma Shri for his remarkable musical achievements, he is celebrated for pioneering the fusion of the santoor with Indian classical melodies on the piano. Recognized globally, the US-based Keyboard magazine named him the fastest keyboard player and hailed him as the standout keyboard talent of the 1990s. Check out our list of the latest Hindi , English , Tamil , Telugu , Malayalam , and Kannada movies . Don't miss our picks for the best Hindi movies , best Tamil movies, and best Telugu films .
Biz Bahrain
15 hours ago
- Business
- Biz Bahrain
iGA invites public to experience Bahrain's latest digital services at Marassi Galleria stand
The Information & eGovernment Authority (iGA) invites citizens and residents in Bahrain to visit its awareness stand at Marassi Galleria, starting this week until Tuesday, June 3, to learn about its latest digital projects. Lulwa Sami, Director of Communications and Marketing at the iGA, confirmed that the awareness stand is part of the Authority's ongoing efforts to enhance communication with citizens and residents, raise awareness about integrated digital services and channels, and provide necessary support. It also aims to open direct channels for feedback to help improve the Authority's digital services and projects. The stand will introduce visitors to several digital projects, including the MyGov app and the updated eKey 2.0, both available on the eGovernment app store ( and the 13th eGovernment Excellence Award 2025. Sami added that the stand coincides with the launch of the 13th eGovernment Excellence Award 2025, where visitors will learn about the award's categories, participation requirements, and evaluation criteria, especially the Citizen Award. She renewed her invitation to citizens and residents to visit the iGA's awareness stand at Marassi Galleria until Tuesday, June 3, and to follow the Authority's official social media accounts @igabahrain for updates. BNA(R)
Yomiuri Shimbun
15 hours ago
- Automotive
- Yomiuri Shimbun
Most New Cars in Norway Are Evs. How a Freezing Country Beat Range Anxiety.
Salwan Georges/The Washington Post New cars parked at a port in Drammen, Norway. FINNMARK, Norway – Just a few years ago, almost no one drove electric vehicles up here. In this remote region north of the Arctic Circle – where reindeer outnumber people, avalanches can bury roads in winter and sunlight disappears for weeks – 'range anxiety' takes on a new meaning. Today, however, nearly all new car sales in Norway are electric. That's true even in Finnmark, the northernmost region in Europe's northernmost country. Norway is 'an unlikely place for a transportation revolution,' acknowledged Christina Bu, head of the Norwegian Electric Vehicle Association. At the Skoda dealership in Alta, Finnmark's largest city, salesman Orjan Dragland marveled at the transformation – how five years ago, every car on the showroom floor had a combustion engine, and now the inventory is all EVs. In 2024, nearly 90 percent of new passenger cars sold in Norway were fully electric. Of the cars sold last month, the EV share was 97 percent. By comparison, EVs last year accounted for 8 percent of new car sales in the United States, 13 percent in the euro zone and 27 percent in China. 'What happened' in Norway? Dragland said. 'The government happened.' Norway has one of the world's most ambitious climate targets. It is aiming to become carbon neutral by 2030, and cutting emissions from road traffic is an important part of that. While the push for EVs has played to people's green sensibilities, the real driver, arguably, has been economic: Generous government incentives, supported at least indirectly by the country's fossil fuel profits, have brought down the cost of owning and operating an EV. 'It's very cheap to drive,' said Ailo Haetta, 43. He had just driven his sister and her new husband to their wedding – which explained his traditional Sami dress and the 'Just Married' sticker on his electric Volkswagen. More-affordable EVs helped accelerate other aspects of Norway's effort to decarbonize its car fleet. Private entities became more willing to take the risk of installing charging stations. And as charging stations began to blanket the country, Norwegians grew more comfortable with EVs. 'The Norwegian experience is really about building confidence,' said transportation research scientist Simen Rostad Saether. Making EVs the more affordable choice It has taken 25 years for Norway to get this far. The government began championing EVs in the early 1990s, with the hope of growing a domestic EV industry while cutting carbon emissions. The Norwegian EV-makers failed. Norway today imports all of its electric vehicles. But Norwegian drivers proved eager to buy EVs souped up by government incentives. Most significant, the government made EV purchases and leases exempt from a 25 percent value-added tax (VAT) – cutting thousands of dollars from the sticker prices – as well as from import and registration taxes. As EVs began to outnumber gas-powered cars on the road, the government scaled back some of the perks. VAT is now assessed over a certain purchase price. EV owners no longer get out of paying city parking fees and annual road taxes. Exemptions from highway tolls and ferry fares have been replaced by discounts. Still, many EVs in Norway are cheaper than or comparable in price to combustion cars – and they cost less to maintain, especially in the context of Europe's high fuel prices (which in Norway incorporate a carbon tax). Elsewhere on the continent, gas-powered cars tend to be subject to lower taxes, and EVs often remain the more expensive choice. Felipe Munoz, an automotive expert at JATO Dynamics, noted that the price of compact electric cars averaged 32,700 euros in the euro zone last year, vs. 19,000 euros for gas ones. 'When you have these big gaps, you understand why people make the decisions they do,' he said. Norway's EV experiment has been made possible by something of a paradox: The country is Europe's largest oil and gas producer, which helps support Norwegians' aspiration to live green. Norway has invested its fossil fuel profits into what has become the world's largest sovereign wealth fund, a nest egg worth $1.7 trillion. Returns from that fund help cover government expenses, which in turn makes it easier to accommodate climate-friendly tax exemptions. The government estimates that between 2007 and 2025, it will have forgone approximately 640 billion kroner (about $62 billion) in various vehicle-related taxes, mostly because of EVs. Norway's wealth means its EV model may not be easy to replicate everywhere. But countries seeking to boost EV adoption wouldn't have to spend as much now, said Rostad Sæther, who is part of the SINTEF research institute. With EV prices dropping globally, he said, other countries could focus less on the cost of cars and more on encouraging infrastructure and trust. Building the charging network Gjermund Pleym Wik is such an evangelizer for EVs that he has organized electric-car convoys through remote, mountainous areas in the far north to ease people's range concerns. Salwan Georges/The Washington Post A taxi driver charges his electric car at a station in Alta, Norway 'Yes, you need to stop and recharge, but it works,' he said, jabbing his finger at a map on a blue display board at Alta's largest charging station. Norway is a long, narrow country with 60,000 miles of roads that snake around fjords and mountainous terrain. Wik, who works in public health, admits that he once miscalculated the distance of a trip and had to unplug a stranger's Christmas lights to recharge. But EV fans say that shouldn't be any more of a deterrent than the prospect of running out of gas. Norway has worked to ensure that drivers are never far from a charging point. Most people charge their EVs at home, and a legal 'right to charge' guarantees access for apartment dwellers. The country also has an extensive charging network – powered almost entirely by renewables – with 9,771 fast chargers in 1,684 locations, according to Lars Lund Godbolt, who maintains the government's database. Godbolt said the longest distance between two fast-charging stations in Finnmark is about 80 miles, and officials say Norway easily bests the European Union target of 60 km (37 miles) between fast chargers on major roads. In one sense, that might not be so hard to achieve in a nation the size of New Mexico. But consider that New Mexico has only 419 fast charging ports, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. In terms of population numbers, Norway is close to South Carolina. But when it comes to fast EV chargers, the gap is yawning: South Carolina has 633 fast charging ports, according to the federal database – around 11 per 100,000 people. Norway, on the other hand, boasts 174 fast chargers per 100,000. The lack of charging infrastructure remains a major barrier to EV adoption in the United States. And that hesitancy, in turn, is deterring private investment in infrastructure to support EVs. Building and maintaining chargers is expensive, and in many areas, there isn't enough driver demand to make stations profitable. To speed up deployment, the Biden administration launched the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program, allocating $5 billion to help states build chargers along key highway corridors, with the goal of reaching 500,000 stations by 2030. The Trump administration, which opposes federal support for electric vehicles, has frozen funding for the program – a freeze that remains in effect although the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office has said withholding the funds approved by Congress is unlawful. In Norway, the government played an active role in initially establishing the charging network. In some cases, to ensure that chargers were placed at regular intervals on main roads, it subsidized up to 100 percent of the installation costs through competitive tenders from 'charging operators.' But since June 2022, new passenger EV charging stations have been built entirely on a commercial basis. (The government continues to support the charging infrastructure for heavy-duty vehicles.) As more charging stations appeared, consumer confidence grew. And as EV ownership expanded, more private entities were willing to take on the risk of building stations. With so many people driving EVs, charging operators could count on a healthy level of business. Some of the stations The Washington Post visited in Oslo offered WiFi and hot food in a small cafe – a place where customers charging their EVs could spend time, and money. Will Norway reach 100 percent? In 2017, Norway set a goal that by 2025 it would have 100 percent zero-emission new car sales. It is close but may fall a few percentage points short. Some climate advocates argue for a ban on imports of fossil fuel cars, like the one Ethiopia introduced last year. Others say reaching a percentage in the high 90s is good enough. 'There's a lot of debate over: 'Do we really need the last 2 or 3 percent? Could those people have a hybrid? Should we use our energy to fight the last percent?'' Rostad Sæther said. Norway still has a ways to go in transitioning its fleet of vehicles on the roads. Last year, it became the first country where EVs outnumber gas cars. But as a result of past encouragement of diesel as a transition fuel, diesel vehicles account for about a third of all cars and trucks – and those may last for years. Some Norwegians have bought an EV not as a replacement but as a second car – to test it out. Askill Halse, an economist at TØI, a transportation research center, said Norway has seen a 'big increase' in car ownership and a modest uptick in overall traffic, despite other policies aimed at reducing driving. Environmentalists argue that the goal should not be more electric cars, but simply fewer cars. In Finnmark – known for its northern lights, striking fjords and vast tundra expanses – there is lingering discomfort with EVs. Last year, 74 percent of new car sales in the region were electric, lagging the national numbers. Proposed copper mining projects, vital for EV batteries, have drawn criticism from Indigenous Sami communities and environmentalists. 'Maybe they should search somewhere where the people aren't as close to the nature,' said Ann-Kristine Bongo, 48, a reindeer herder who drives an EV. Interviews with locals highlighted other concerns: inconvenient charging apps, long waits at charging stations and reduced winter range. The Norwegian Automobile Federation determined that EVs have an average range loss of about 20 percent in cold weather. Opting for a heat pump to warm the cabin, rather than relying on the battery, can help. One driver said he wears a snowsuit on exceptionally cold days to save battery on cabin heat. Carpenter Tormod Simonsen, 21, said he didn't yet trust an EV for traveling to the mountains. 'I've gotten stuck many times – road closures, avalanches,' he said, filling up his gas-powered Volvo at a gas station in Alta. 'If I just drove in the city, okay. But in the mountains? You need to trust your ride.' A growing number of Norwegians, though, are being won over, with many citing cost as the primary motivator. Taxi driver Tommi Olsen estimated that switching to an EV has cut his expenses by about 20 percent. Alta's main taxi company is now 75 percent electric, aiming for 100 percent by October. Even electric snowmobiles are appearing. Tour guide Jørgen Wisløff tested one for northern lights tours at his 'ice hotel.' But it costs $6,000 more than the gas version. So he said he'd consider buying it if the government offered tax breaks to make the price more competitive. Wisløff said he's happy, though, with his white electric Ford Mustang, which he noted was cheaper to buy than its gas equivalent. It gets 400 km on a full charge in winter and 500 km in summer – or about 250 miles and 310 miles. With charging points every 70 km (45 miles) or so on his journeys, he said, he rarely worries. 'That's why it's working here in Norway,' he said.
Channel Post MEA
2 days ago
- Business
- Channel Post MEA
Google Cloud Summit Held In Doha
Google Cloud hosted its second annual Google Cloud Summit in Doha, held under the patronage of His Excellency Mohammed bin Ali bin Mohammed Al Mannai, Minister of Communications and Information Technology, bringing together over 1,500 industry leaders, developers, and IT professionals. The Summit marks two years of the Google Cloud Doha region empowering local innovation and is set to explore the latest advancements in AI, data analytics, and cloud technologies. The event featured significant discussions and announcements on strategic collaborations, including key developments with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) aimed at advancing Qatar's digital transformation journey. The Google Cloud Summit Doha showcased the vibrant tech ecosystem in Qatar and Google Cloud's commitment to it. Attendees experienced keynotes from Google Cloud executives and Qatari leaders, gained insights into transformative AI technologies like Gemini, AI Agents, and NotebookLM, heard compelling customer success stories, and participated in deep-dive sessions on data management and cybersecurity. This ongoing partnership with Qatar is poised to play a vital role in building a resilient, secure, and digitally advanced ecosystem in the nation. Mr. Sami added that 'by providing access to cutting-edge cloud technologies, Google Cloud is empowering entities alike to innovate, improve service delivery, and accelerate progress across key sectors. Their contributions in areas such as artificial intelligence and data analytics are also playing a pivotal role in developing local digital talent and equipping our workforce with the skills needed for tomorrow's challenges. We are eager to continue this productive partnership, further solidifying Qatar's digital future and working in tandem to realize the ambitious goals of the Digital Agenda 2030 and Qatar National Vision 2030.' Ghassan Kosta, Regional General Manager, Google Cloud Qatar, Oman, Bahrain and Iraq, said: 'Today's Google Cloud Summit in Doha marks a truly pivotal moment in our Qatari journey, celebrating two years of our local cloud region and our strong partnerships. We are deeply honored by the continued collaboration with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology and their trust in Google Cloud. This success is a shared achievement, magnified by the crucial contributions of all our partners and the inspiring innovation of our customers who join us in celebrating today. Together, by providing our advanced AI, data analytics, and secure cloud infrastructure through our local Doha region, we are committed to accelerating Qatar's digital transformation, empowering its public services, and energizing its dynamic digital economy.' The Summit also highlighted how a diverse range of leading Qatari organizations are leveraging Google Cloud for their transformation journeys. These include Al Jazeera Media Network (AJMN), Aspire, beIN MEDIA GROUP, Media City Qatar, Ministry of Endowment & Islamic Affairs (Awqaf), Ministry of Labour, Ooredoo Group, Ooredoo Qatar, Qatar Airways, Qatar Foundation Pre-University Education, Qatar Free Zones Authority (QFZA), Qatar Insurance Company (QIC), Snoonu, University of Doha for Science and Technology (UDST) among many others who are driving innovation across various sectors. 0 0
