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Top recruiters at the country’s leading business schools are increasingly taking the internship route for hiring instead of final placements, as it gives them more time to assess talent. Internship gives companies and candidates around two months to determine the right fit compared to 30-45 minutes in the final placements, recruiters and officials at Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) said. Deutsche Bank India hires around 200 interns annually. This year, it is visiting B-schools such as IIM Bangalore, IIM Lucknow, IIM Indore and XLRI to hire interns for roles in investment banking, HR and corporate banking. “By partnering with leading B-schools and engineering institutes, and offering best-in-class stipends, we ensure students gain meaningful exposure while we identify the leaders of tomorrow,” said Madhavi Lall, head of HR, Deutsche Bank India. Deutsche Bank relies more on the internship route as it enables both the candidate and the organisation to assess fit before making a long-term commitment, she said. “This approach ensures better alignment and retention.” 124817556 Each year, L&T onboards over 60 MBA interns from premier B-schools across India. “We increasingly view internships as a strategic gateway to full-time hiring,” said C Jayakumar, CHRO, L&T. The infrastructure major has a two-month summer internship programme for MBA students. This year it is also launching the L&T global internship programme. The campuses that L&T visits include the IIMs, XLRI, FMS, IIFT, TISS, MDI and SIBM, among others, he said. “Particularly for our MBA hiring programme, the internship route has emerged as a key strategic talent pipeline,” said Jayakumar. The number of students receiving job offers after completing internships is increasing year on year for IIM Ahmedabad over the last three years or so. “Summer internship serves as a great vehicle for firms to see how the candidate fits their requirements, especially when companies increasingly look at candidates holistically,” said Viswanath Pingali, chairperson-placements at IIM Ahmedabad. According to Debashis Chatterjee, director, IIM Kozhikode, industry is looking for transitional skills such as communication, problem-solving etc, which students acquire during internships while working with real organisations. Companies have begun to understand that the cost of imparting transitional skills at the end of the programme is probably much more than if they were to acquire those during the summer, said Chatterjee. Summer placements have always found favour with companies, but now they are liked even more. As a result, the stipends are also moving north. IIM Lucknow recorded an average stipend of `1.67 lakh per month for the 2025-27 batch. IIM Bangalore, which concluded 2026 summer placements, witnessed a record 46% consulting offers, while the healthcare offers were up by 70%.

US President Donald Trump met Saturday with the emir and prime minister of Qatar -- a key ally in preserving the fragile Gaza peace deal -- during a refueling stop on his way to Asia, officials said.The Qatari leaders boarded Air Force One when it landed at Al Udeid Air Base, which hosts the regional headquarters for the US military and thousands of American troops.Trump said the duo had played a crucial role in the Middle East peace process, adding that Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani had been his "friend to the world."

Mumbai: The Indian unit of global streaming giant Netflix reported a 63% increase in net profit to ₹85 crore for FY25, according to its filings with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA), sourced from Tofler. Netflix Entertainment Services India LLP had posted a profit of ₹52 crore in the previous financial year.Revenue from operations grew 32% to ₹3,769 crore from ₹2,846 crore a year earlier, driven by strong subscriber additions through direct acquisitions and bundling partnerships with telecom operators.While Netflix does not disclose subscriber numbers, industry estimates place its base at around 20-22 million users across direct-to-consumer and bundled plans.Including other income of ₹73 crore, total income stood at ₹3,842 crore. Total expenditure rose 32% to ₹3,711 crore from ₹2,811 crore."Other expenses", which cover key operational costs such as content production, marketing and related expenses, increased to ₹3,616 crore in FY25 from ₹2,688 crore. Personnel costs declined to ₹88 crore from ₹106 crore.Netflix India declined to comment on the financials.124812770Total assets and liabilities rose to ₹1,368 crore as on March 31, 2025 from ₹1,116 crore a year earlier. The LLP had no secured or unsecured loans during the year.Partner contributions remained unchanged at ₹65 crore, while reserves and surplus grew to ₹218 crore from ₹133 crore in FY24, reflecting retained earnings for the year.Trade payables and customer advances increased to ₹863 crore from ₹703 crore, while deferred revenue and statutory dues stood at ₹214 crore, marginally higher than ₹208 crore a year earlier.Cash and cash equivalents stood at ₹800 crore, compared with ₹861 crore at the end of FY24. Loans and advances jumped to ₹371 crore from ₹115 crore, while trade receivables rose to ₹137 crore from ₹86 crore.The filings noted potential income tax liabilities for assessment years 2021-22 and 2022-23 that are "not reasonably ascertainable" due to ongoing proceedings before the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal and the Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals).At the World Audio Visual and Entertainment Summit held in Mumbai in May, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos said the company's investments in India generated an economic impact of $2 billion between 2021 and 2024.Sarandos said Indian content gained strong global traction and contributed 15% to Netflix's Top 10 non-English titles worldwide in 2024. At least one Indian title featured in the global Top 10 every week, with stories from the country reaching audiences in more than 80 nations.

Islamabad: Pakistan's total public debt reached USD 286.832 billion (PKR 80.6 trillion ) as of June 2025, which is almost 13 per cent higher than the previous year, according to the official data."The total public debt of Pakistan has reached PKR 80.6 trillion as of June 25, out of which domestic debt is PKR 54.5 trillion and external debt is PKR 26.0 trillion. This increase is almost 13 per cent over the FY-24," the data said.The Ministry of Finance issued the Annual Debt Review for FY 2025 last month, showing details of the public debt by the end of June 2025, when the financial year ended.It showed that in terms of the Debt-to-GDP ratio, the public debt increased to around 70 per cent in June 2025, as compared to 68 per cent in June 2024. "This was mostly due to lower-than expected growth in the nominal GDP in FY-2025, as significantly lower inflation reduced the pace of economic expansion, thereby pushing up the debt-to-GDP ratio despite fiscal consolidation efforts," it said."The domestic debt increased by 15 per cent Year-on-Year, reaching PKR 54.5 trillion, the lowest annual increase in the past three fiscal years," it said.External debt increased by 6 per cent YoY, reaching USD 91.8 billion as of June 2025, and the major reasons for this increase were disbursements from the IMF, an ADB-guarantee-backed commercial loan of USD 1 billion and inflows from other multilateral institutions.As of June 2025, 84 per cent of Pakistan's external public debt is primarily held by the Federal Government, while 16 per cent is owned by provinces and sub-national entities. Within the provinces, Punjab is the largest borrower with USD 6.18 billion (7 per cent), followed by Sindh at USD 4.67 billion (5 per cent), which recorded the sharpest increase during the year.Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's debt rose to USD 2.77 billion (3 per cent), whereas Baluchistan USD 371 million and Pakistan occupied Kashmir USD 281 million, according to the document.