Presidential Election 2017 Results LIVE: Ram Nath Kovind leads, 'Not upset', says Meira Kumar

Presidential Election 2017 - On July 17, of the total 4,880 valid voters — 4,109 members of legislative Assemblies (MLAs) and 771 elected members of Parliament (MPs) — 99.49 per cent cast their vote to elect the next President of India. In the fray were the National Democratic Alliance's (NDA's) candidate Ram Nath Kovind, and the Opposition candidate Meira Kumar.

The counting of votes is scheduled to begin at 11 am on Thursday, July 20, but it is believed that Kovind has an edge over Kumar. However, should he win, the margin of his victory will be interesting to note, given that there were reports of many instances where voters from Opposition parties also voting for Kovind in the election.

“The voting was close to 99 per cent. I think this would perhaps be the highest-ever percentage,” Anoop Mishra, Lok Sabha, secretary general and returning officer for the election, had said on Monday.

Mishra had said while the sanctioned strength of the Lok Sabha (LS) and the Rajya Sabha (RS) is 776 (543 and 233), 771 MPs were eligible to cast their votes. There are two vacancies each in the LS and the RS, while one BJP MP, Chhedi Paswan, did not have voting rights following a judicial pronouncement.

Of the total 771 MPs who are entitled to vote, 768, or 99.61 per cent, cast their votes. Likewise, of the 4,109 MLAs entitled to vote, 4,083 or 99.37 per cent cast their votes, officials said.

GET LIVE UPDATES ON Presidential Election 2017 Results

Presidential Election 2017 Results LIVE: Counting of votes begins; Kovind has an edge in Presidential race

Presidential Election 2017 - On July 17, of the total 4,880 valid voters — 4,109 members of legislative Assemblies (MLAs) and 771 elected members of Parliament (MPs) — 99.49 per cent cast their vote to elect the next President of India. In the fray were the National Democratic Alliance's (NDA's) candidate Ram Nath Kovind, and the Opposition candidate Meira Kumar.

The counting of votes is scheduled to begin at 11 am on Thursday, July 20, but it is believed that Kovind has an edge over Kumar. However, should he win, the margin of his victory will be interesting to note, given that there were reports of many instances where voters from Opposition parties also voting for Kovind in the election.

“The voting was close to 99 per cent. I think this would perhaps be the highest-ever percentage,” Anoop Mishra, Lok Sabha, secretary general and returning officer for the election, had said on Monday.

Mishra had said while the sanctioned strength of the Lok Sabha (LS) and the Rajya Sabha (RS) is 776 (543 and 233), 771 MPs were eligible to cast their votes. There are two vacancies each in the LS and the RS, while one BJP MP, Chhedi Paswan, did not have voting rights following a judicial pronouncement.

Of the total 771 MPs who are entitled to vote, 768, or 99.61 per cent, cast their votes. Likewise, of the 4,109 MLAs entitled to vote, 4,083 or 99.37 per cent cast their votes, officials said.

GET LIVE UPDATE ON Presidential Election 2017 Results

Facebook's 'Hello' Button is causing a lot of trouble: Here's why

TECHNOLOGY NEWS - The "Hello" button, rolled out silently by Facebook for some users as part of testing last month, has created trouble for some users as they are complaining about using it accidentally.

The "Hello" button allows users to get people's attention by sending them a virtual "Wave", similar to the infamous Facebook "Poke".

Since "Hello" is placed right next to the "Add Friend" button, some users clicked on the wrong choice unintentionally, finding themselves in an awkward confrontation, Mirror.co.uk reported on Wednesday.

"This could be particularly awkward if you were checking out the profile of someone you don't know or -- even worse -- stalking an ex-partner," the report said.

However, the users can undo their mistake by tapping the button again and hitting the "OK" option that pops up.

"The feature is still in a testing phase and not all users have it on their profiles yet," the report added.

BSE Midcap index hits fresh high, up over 1% for the day

STOCK MARKET - The S&P BSE Midcap index hit a new high of 15,265, up 1% on BSE, after a strong gain in oil & gas, metals and financial stocks. The index surpassed its previous high of 15,247.90 touched on Monday, July 17, 2017 in intra-day trade.

Mangalore Refinery & Petrochemicals (up 6% at Rs 130) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (up 4% at Rs 383) from the oil & gas sector up more than 3% on merger talk with Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC).

Wockhardt, Alkem Laboratories, Divi’s Laboratories and Glenmark Pharmaceuticals from the pharma sector up 3%-4%, while Bajaj Finserv, Indian Bank, Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services, Indian Bank and Bank of India from the financials including banks were up between 2% and 3% on BSE.

A Reuters poll showed that India will reclaim its position as the fastest growing major global economy this year, partly propelled by benefits from Goods and Service Tax (GST) regime and bolstered by an expected interest rate cut by RBI in its next policy meeting in August.

India's annual retail inflation eased to 1.54% in June, its slowest pace in more than five years, but is expected to begin rising again through to mid-2018.

With inflation currently well below its target, the central bank is expected to cut borrowing costs by 25 basis points (bps) at its next meeting on Aug. 2. It last cut rates, by the same amount, to 6.25% in October 2016.

Mastek zooms 20% on strong Q1 results

STOCK MARKET - Mastek is locked in upper circuit of 20% at Rs 359 on BSE with only buyers seen on the counter after the company reported more than six-fold jump in its consolidated net profit at Rs 14.66 crore in June quarter (Q1FY18).

The IT software products company had profit of Rs 2.34 crore in June 2016 quarter. It had profit of Rs 10.5 crore in March 2017 quarter.

Revenues from operations during quarter under review increased by 43.6% to Rs 186 crore from Rs 129 crore in the corresponding quarter of previous fiscal.

On constant currency terms, the revenue growth was 5.3% on sequential basis, Mastek said in a press release.

EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization) margin expanded 170 basis points to 13.2% in Q1FY18 as against 11.5% in Q4FY17, it added.

The stock is trading close to its 52-week high of Rs 363 touched on May 11, 2017 on BSE in intra-day trade. The trading volumes on the counter surged 10-fold with a combined 3.78 million shares changed hands on NSE and BSE. There were pending buy orders for 246,622 shares on both the exchanges at 1:29 pm.