Today there is lot of hype around climate change and this hype is not misplaced by any means. After all, earth is possibly the only planet where life exists and this planet is now at great risk. Dozens of countries, big corporations and environmental activists are coming up with many possible solutions to combat climate change. Reducing the use of plastics, cutting down on fossil fuel and using renewable energy are some of the top solutions; solutions that many environmental experts believe will help in overcoming the climate change problem.

But there is one particular solution that has caught everyone’s imagination. A solution that today has created a multi-billion dollar industry. I am talking about the electric vehicle industry. EV cars are being pitched as the best alternative to petrol & diesel cars, which are responsible for releasing huge amount of fossil fuel into our environment. Companies like Tesla and dozens of  big auto-giants are today investing billions of dollars in the EV technology. These auto companies are promising a safer and greener future for the entire mankind. But this rosy future of a clean and green environment won’t be possible without paying a huge price. The EV industry that looks glittery and flashy from the outside is actually unleashing a massive human catastrophe. Deep beneath the shiny exterior of this multi-billion dollar industry lies the story of extreme human poverty, child labour and gross human right violations. This is the dark and evil side of the EV industry. Something that Tesla and no other auto companies will ever tell you. However, in this special show, we’ll unravel the dark side of the electric vehicle industry for our viewers.

We all know that electric vehicles run on rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. It is eventually these lithium-ion batteries that will help in reducing our dependence on petrol and diesel. But do you know what really goes into making and manufacturing of these batteries. The answer is Cobalt. The greyish blue material whose demand has exploded over the years. Today almost all auto companies are in a race to get their hands over this material. Due to its excessive demand, today Cobalt is one of the most sought after minerals in the world.

Cobalt is found in several countries like Canada, China, Cuba, South Africa and United States. But there is one country where this material is found in huge abundance. In fact, this country holds 70% of the Cobalt reserve found in the world. This country is the Democratic Republic of Congo or DRC.

DRC is the second largest country of the African continent. Despite being home to several rich minerals like blood diamond and cobalt, it is still one of the poorest countries in the world. With poverty and unemployment running rampant, the poor people in Congo will do anything to make a living. And today cobalt mining is one of the few means through which Congo people are desperately trying to survive.

In Congo, cobalt mining is done through two ways. First is the industrial, i.e. large scale mining and second is the small scale mining. It is the latter, i.e. small scale mining, that is notorious for brazenly abusing labour laws and safety protocols. Almost 20-30% of the country’s cobalt is mined in the small scale mines where almost 2,000,00 miners are employed. Out of these 2,000,00 miners, nearly 40,000 are estimated to be children, some of whom are as young as six year old.

These young innocent children put their lives at risk almost on daily basis so that they can make a living and survive for another day. They enter vertical tunnels that is sometime so narrow that it is almost impossible to pass through it. These young children work in these cobalt mines in the most inhumane and brutal conditions. Many a times they are not even provided with masks and gloves. What’s even more worse, sometimes they are provided with only 20 minutes of oxygen at a time. But despite these life threatening challenges, these children keep on digging. And once they get their hand at cobalt after relentless digging, they crash, wash and then finally take them to the nearest market for selling them. Now can you really imagine how much money these children make. Get ready for a shocker. Sometimes they make less than $1. Yes, after putting their life at risk, all they make is less than $1.

Today Cobalt mining may be a multi-dollar industry, which is estimated to reach worth $18 Bn by next five years. But all these astronomical money remains mostly stuck with big auto companies and few business tycoons. These money never reaches to that child in Congo who wages war against death so that he can live for another day. In a poverty ridden country like DRC, even a dollar is worth risking life for. And not surprisingly, many Congo citizens end up dying every year.

News network ABC recently interviewed a mother who lost her 13 year old son while working in a cobalt mine. Depressed by his family’s extreme poverty, he decided to go and work in a cobalt mine and earn some money for his poor family. But little did he know that this decision will end up costing his life.

According to a rough estimate, nearly 2,000 illegal miners die every year in poverty stricken Congo. In 2019, a single accident killed at least 43 miners in one go. Many DRC citizens also suffer from permanent lung damage, skin infection and other serious injuries due to cobalt mining.

Few Congolese families even decided to drag many auto companies including Tesla to court. They accused these auto companies of promoting child labour and pushing many to death and life threatening injuries. This lawsuit made a special reference about young  Congolese kid called John Doe One. Since the young age, John had been working as a human mule, carrying tonnes of cobalt bags from cobalt mines to markets. He earned only $0.75 per day for doing this inhuman work.

On one fine day John accidentally fell into the Cobalt mine. Although his fellow workers immediately dragged him out and managed to save his life, the accident ended up permanently damaging his legs. Doctors later revealed that John’s legs have been paralyzed and he will never be able to walk again.

For millions of Congolese, cobalt is their only hope that can help them in escaping the abject poverty.

The booming EV industry that sold almost 6.5 Mn EV cars in 2021 is driving the huge demand for cobalt. Most industry experts claim that the total sales of EV cars is likely to touch 66 Mn cars by  the year 2040. This means that the demand for cobalt is only going to increase in the coming decades. As per World Bank’s estimates, Cobalt’s demand will increase by whopping 600% by 2050. What does all these fact mean for Congolese people. It simply means that they will have more work to do at the cobalt mines and hope to escape their miserable poverty. But what it also means is that thousands of Congolese children will end up losing their lives and many will have to endure life-threatening injuries for rest of their lives. The future of children in Congo is indeed bleak. For most of them working in cobalt mines and risking their lives is not a matter of choice but necessity. A necessity that helps them and their families to live for another day.

Chinese connection & Global Cobalt Industry

There is also a deep Chinese connection to the global cobalt industry and the human catastrophe that it is unleashing. Today China controls more than half of the companies engaged in cobalt mining. The Asian giant alone produces nearly 70% of the cobalt found in the world, as per Mining.com. During last one decade or so, China has went onto acquire several American and European cobalt companies operating in DRC. As things stand today, China alone controls almost 15 out of 19 industrial cobalt mines in DRC.

This is yet another classic case of how China has reduced an underdeveloped and poor country into its financial colony. All because China wants complete control over the global cobalt production. With Congo almost fulfilling China’s wish, in return the Asian giant has promised better roads, schools and investment worth billions of dollar.

China had started investing in cobalt mines way back in 2010. Back then except for China, nobody had sensed that one day this mineral will become so precious and a sought after material. Today China’s bet is paying off quite handsomely as the EV industry is currently fuelling monumental demand for cobalt. With China now enjoying a complete monopoly over cobalt production, it is today in a position to control the global supply chain of the entire EV industry. This also means that the Asian giant is already enjoying lions share in a industry that is estimated to become a multi-billion dollar industry in the near future. And now think about this fact from the context of China’s ambition to become a super-power. And you’ll immediately realize why has China invested so heavily in cobalt mining.

However, in the process of fulfilling its super-power ambition, China is making the lives of millions of Congolese children into a living hell. Several media reports claim that in many Chinese controlled cobalt mines, labourers are abused, discriminated and beaten mercilessly. Sometimes they are even forced to worked without a contract. In case if some workers die,  their corpses are secretly hidden in an attempt to cover up. Their families are later bribed for keeping their mouth shut.

But China alone cannot be hold responsible for inflicting inhuman atrocities against the DRC citizens. Big auto companies like Tesla, Volvo, Mercedes Benz, General Motors, Ford and Toyota are equally complicit in this crime. All these big companies source cobalt from Chinese controlled mines, which eventually helps them in manufacturing lithium-ion batteries that end up powering most of their electric vehicles. These lithium-ion batteries are nothing but ‘blood batteries,’ sucking blood and life out of the innocent Congolese children. In public, these auto companies may claim of having zero tolerance for child labour but they are obviously lying. Most of these auto companies are completely aware about the child abuse and rampant child labour taking place in Congo’s cobalt mines. But they choose to remain silent. These companies have been blinded by naked greed and blind hunger for profit.

In 2020, Tesla did announce that it will soon start using cobalt free lithium-ion batteries. But it later turned out that Elon Musk’s company wasn’t really serious about this decision. Shortly after making this announcement, Tesla reportedly signed an agreement with cobalt mining company, Glencore, for delivering 6,000 tonnes of cobalt per year.

Next time when you end up buying an expensive EV car and feel proud about it, do spare a few thoughts for the Congolese children. Who knows that EV car might have costed the life of a young kid in Congo or may have left a young Congo kid completely paralyzed for entire life.

Your EV cars and EV bikes are actually running on blood batteries. This is not climate solution, this is outright human abuse and human right violation. Today most EV companies are never tired of promising clean and green environment. But remember that their promise of a clean and green environment is actually stained with ‘blood.’

The post The Evil Side of Electric Vehicle Industry appeared first on Platform to Showcase Innovative Startups and Tech News.

Most of us have seen several photos of Elon Musk’s childhood and teenage life where he is seen sharing photos with all his siblings including his mother Maye Musk. But there is one important person that is missing in all these photos. It is Elon Musk’s father Errol Musk. Musk shares a very complicated and uneasy relationship with his father. Musk once even described his father as a ‘evil person.’ Undoubtedly, Errol Musk has had a very deep influence on his son’s life. This is the story of how he helped in shaping the destiny of a man who today is the richest man in the world.

Errol Musk was born in South Africa’s capital city Pretoria. He belonged to a family that was famous for its intellectual capabilities. Musk’s family members and ancestors had a long history of excelling in studies and academics and Errol Musk was not proving to be an exception. He proudly carried his family heritage and later went on to become a pretty successful engineer.

Errol’s future wife Maye Musk also lived in Pretoria. Their lives crossed each other while studying in a college. Errol was swayed by Maye’s stunning and gorgeous looks. Blessed with good looks, Maye was pursued by many other guys during the college days. But it was Errol who with his obsessive passion managed to stole her heart. People say that Errol and Maye’s whirlwind romance had become talk of the town in the university campus.

Recounting Errol’s obsessive love for her, Maye told Elon’s biographer Ashlee Vance “he simply never stopped proposing.”

Interestingly, very much like his father, Elon also proved to be an obsessive lover when he grew up. Elon showed the same relentless obsession while pursuing her first wife Justine during his college days in Canada. It was like Elon had decided to walk on his father’s footsteps when it came to romance & love.

Justin had explicitly mentioned biographer Vance about Elon’s non-stop phone calls and how he pursued her like a crazy lover.

“You always knew it was Elon because the phone would never stopped ringing. The man never takes no for an answer. You can’t blow him off. I do think him of as the Terminator. He locks his gaze on to something and says, ‘it shall be mine.’ Bit by bit, he won me over.”

After years of dating, Errol and Maye finally decided to tie the knot and became husband and wife. Elon was born only nine months after their marriage.

Although back then neither Errol nor Maye could have ever predicated that one day their son would become a famous billionaire, they were amazed by their new born son’s unique and amazing qualities. At a very young age, Elon had started asking deep philosophical questions to his parents. Errol shared one such anecdote with South African radio station 702’s the Money Show with Bruce Whitfield.

Errol’s Radio interview excerpts

“He has always been a very deep thinker. When he was very small, for example, he would ask me: “where is the whole world?” Good question. It is a very good question. I’m talking about when he was three or four”       

Elon Musk’s family lived a pretty comfortable life in Pretoria. Financially, the family was pretty much sound and self-sufficient. Elon and his brother got pretty much whatever they wanted. This was all thanks to Errol Musk’s highly successful engineering company and his thriving real estate business. Since Errol achieved lot of success in the professional career, the young Elon saw his father as sort of a role model. In the later years, Elon went on to describe his father as a person with high IQ and someone who achieved great success in the electrical and mechanical engineering.

Errol made every effort to pass on his high IQ and his expertise skills to his sons. At a very young age, he started giving them practical knowledge about civil engineering. He taught them about how to lay the house foundation, laying bricks, install plumbing and putting electrical wires.

It was also Errol who introduced his young son to computers. This one decision by Errol went on to change his son’s life forever and possibly laid the foundation of his son’s future success. Elon became so excited and passionate about computers that he insisted about learning this technology. Impressed by his son’s passion for learning computers, Errol secured Elon’s admission in a computer course at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. This despite the fact that Elon was only 11 years old back then. According to people close to Musk’s family, Errol had used his engineering connections to get his son admission in the Witwatersrand University.

As soon as Elon started attending this computer crash course, he immediately started making impression on his professors. Errol gave a detailed account about how one of the professors was deeply impressed by Elon’ computer skills.

With that discounted computer, Elon became a self-taught computer programmer. He learnt several computer programmes by himself. His incredible passion for computers had started reflecting on his grades. While briefly attending the University of Pretoria, he notched up an A+ on a aptitude test for programming and operating a computer. According to Elon’s mother, the university management was so surprised by Elon’s excellent grade that they compelled him to take a retest.

While the young Elon had started taking solace in his passion for computers, his personal life had already started disintegrating. And this was largely thanks to his father Errol. Errol’s increasingly erratic behavior had started taking toll on his marriage. And Errol and Maye eventually got divorced in 1979, when Elon was still very young. Maye blamed Errol’s abusive behavior for breaking their marriage.

After the divorce, Maye and her children faced great financial difficulties. As a single mother, she even struggled to fulfil the basic necessities for her children. Their financial situation became so desperate that one day when one of her children spilled milk on the floor, Maye couldn’t help but cry as she could not afford another milk carton. To ease off their financial problems, Maye started doing multiple jobs and began to cut down on their daily expenses. From buying second hand clothes to cooking cheap nutritious meals, Musk’s family had started living a life that was far cry from their once comfortable life.

As Musk struggled to cope with his new life, he started missing his father. Not only because he was missing his once comfortable and carefree life but he actually cared for his father. He felt sorry that his father was living a lonely life. It was as if Elon felt a deep connection with his father. Eventually after couple of years, Elon decided to shift to Johannesburg to live with his father. However, this decision backfired as Elon got exposed to his father’s dark and evil side. Although Elon’s mother had accused Errol of being downright abusive during their marriage, Elon had somehow remained immune to his dad’s dark side. But Elon was left shocked when he finally got exposed to his father’s dark nature.

Recounting his father’s abusive behavior, Elon told Rolling Stone

“He was such a terrible human being. You have no idea. My dad will have a carefully thought-out plan of evil. He will plan evil. Almost every crime you can possibly think of he has done.”

Elon never gave any explicit details about his father’s abusive behavior. But many distributing facts about Errol’s personal life are already out in the public domain. By Errol’s own admission, he had once shot and killed three people who were trying to break into his home. But despite committing a heinous crime, Errol was pardoned on the grounds of self-defense.

Another controversial aspect of Errol’s personal life is that he also had a child with his own step-daughter Jana Bezuidenhout, who was born from another marriage. Errol tried to justify this unusual romantic relationship by arguing that his step-daughter had turned to him for solace after she broke up with her boyfriend. And the child was conceived as they both failed to control their strong sexual urge.

Although Elon himself admitted that his father was never personally violent towards him, Errol’s abusive habits and disturbing personal life nonetheless left deep scars on him. When Elon grew up and become a famous personality, he rarely spoke anything good about his father during public interviews.

Distributed by his constant negative portrayal and taunts, Errol once hit back at Elon and made many unflattering comments about his son.

Speaking to Daily Mail, Errol said “Elon needs to grow up. He needs to get over himself. I am not going to hit back. I’m going to wait until he comes to his senses. He’s having a tantrum, like a spoilt child.”

Elon also contradicted and flatly denied Errol’s claim of becoming incredibly rich after divorcing his mother. Errol had once claimed to The Business Insider that he owned half of an emerald mine in Zambia. In another interview, Errol claimed “we had so much money that we couldn’t even close our safe”

However, Musk once took to Twitter to bust these claims. Not only he denied Errol’s claim of becoming rich but also explicitly said that after divorcing his mother his father never helped him financially to build his career.

“He didn’t own an emerald mine & I worked my way through college, ending up with $100,000 in student debt and couldn’t afford second computer at his first company Zip2”

Elon further claimed that when he left South Africa and migrated to North Africa, he had just $2000 in his pocket.

Elon was only 17 years old when he arrived at his mother’s birthplace Canada. Although their life in Canada was better off, it was still very much a humble life. For a brief time, the Musk family lived in a rented home at 4000 Yong St. in Toronto. According to Maye, they lived a very modest life in this rented home and Musk had to sleep on the couch.

Although settled in Canada, Musk always dreamt of settling down in the United States, a land of great technological innovations. Musk always knew that U.S. is the place where he can fulfil his entrepreneurial ambitions. Although Musk always had high expectations from himself, his father did not.

By Elon’s own account, while leaving for Canada his father categorically told him that he’d be back in South Africa within three months and he was an idiot. Today that idiot man has become the world’s richest man. That same idiot man went on to found two of the most innovative and successful companies of modern times – Tesla and SpaceX.

Today many experts claim that Musk’s urge to become a savior and solve the profound problems confronting humanity has a deep connection with painful experiences he experienced during his childhood life. His parent’s broken marriage and his father’s abusive behavior may have helped in nurturing deep-seated desire in Musk to become a saviour for humanity.

The famous magazine Rolling Stone perfectly summed up this connection in the following words:

The Rolling Stone wrote: “Somewhere in this trauma bond is the key to Musk’s worldview – creation against destruction, of being useful versus harmful or defending the world against evil.”

Today even his father, who once called his son idiot and terrorized him with his abusive behavior, believes that Elon will manage to pull off one of his greatest ambitions: to take mankind to planet Mars.

When question about his son Elon’s mars mission, Errol said the following words:

He is indeed going to Mars. I don’t think there is any doubt in it whatsoever.”

Today even though Errol may believe in Elon’s abilities, it is unlikely that Elon will ever take his own father to Mars. Their relation continues to remain strained as before. But there is no denying that Errol has a left a deep influence on his son’s life. Today Elon may hate his father. But deep down even Elon will have to unwillingly accept that his father played an instrumental role in shaping his destiny.

The post Errol Musk: The Brilliant Evil Father Creates a Genius Son appeared first on Platform to Showcase Innovative Startups and Tech News.

Wazrix, COIN DCX, CoinSwitch Kuber and 8 other leading top crypto exchanges of the country have been fined amounting to over Rs 81 Crore for evasion of GST tax. While Rs 81 crore was the official figure as calculated in terms of fines & penalties, the Finance Ministry ended up recovering much higher amount. The final amount recovered from the 11 crypto exchanges is quoted to be around Rs 95 Cr

This information came to light after the Ministry of Finance responded to a query on the floor of parliament. This development comes as hardly surprising since earlier this month the news was already out that tax authorities are likely to go behind crypto investors who are defaulting on GST tax.

Nearly 50% of the Rs 95 crore GST due was paid by Wazrix, which is one of the leading crypto exchanges of India. Since last year Wazrix has already been earning lot of bad press due to its constant face-off with tax authorities while the latest news will further add to its bad press. However, Wazrix shrugged off the latest GST notice after claiming that there was ambiguity regarding a GST component, eventually leading to miscalculation in GST. Wazrix clarified the same while talking to news portal Entrackr.

50% or rest of the dues were paid by the 10 other crypto exchanges who had to pay relatively smaller amount. For instance, Coin DCX had to pay Rs 17.10 Cr, BuyUCoin had to pay Rs 1.10 Cr and CoinSwitchKuber had to pay Rs 16.7 Cr respectively.

Indian government’s hot pursuit against crypto exchanges has come barely a month after the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced during her budget speech that all digital assets like cryptos and NFTs will soon be taxed around 30%. However, the Indian government has categorically maintained that by bringing ‘digital assets’ under taxation does not mean that virtual assets will enjoy legal tender status.

List of Crypto exchanges notified for Tax evasion

• Wazrix
• Coin DCX
• CoinSwitch Kuber
• UnoCoin
• Flitpay
• Zeb IT Services Pvt Ltd
• Secure Bitcoin Traders Pvt. Ltd
• Giottus Technologies Pvt Ltd
• Zebpay
• Discidium Internet Labs Pvt ltd

The post Wazrix, COIN DCX & other top Crypto Exchanges fined Rs 95 Cr for GST Evasion appeared first on Platform to Showcase Innovative Startups and Tech News.

1)

Tesla’s market valuation increases by $84Bn a day after Stock Spilt Signal

Tesla added another $84Bn to its stock market value on Monday, a day after Elon Musk tweeted that Tesla will be soon seeking shareholder approval for a stock-spilt. The electric car manufacturer has said in its filing that it will seek approval from its shareholders at the upcoming annual meeting to opt for a stock-spilt. Meanwhile, the stock-spilt decision had a positive impact on Tesla’s stock as the stock surged by nearly 8% on Monday and ended at $1091.84

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TikTok is testing ‘Watch History’ – making it easier to watch ‘past videos’

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Youtube is testing emoji reaction

If Youtube has its way then you’ll soon be able to react to Youtube video with an emoji. According to reports, Youtube is currently testing time bond emoji reactions for small group  of users in select markets. Youtube viewers can express themselves with emojis as and when any specific moment in the video touches them emotionally – either positively or negatively. Although Google keeps testing new features for its streaming platform, not all testing features become a permanent part of Youtube (Read more)

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This AI headset helps Astronaut to prep for long term space travel

How does space travel really effect the human brain? The answer to this question is likely to be revealed pretty soon when astronauts traveling in a SpaceX shuttle next week to ISS will get to wear a special AI designed headset. This special AI headset has been designed by Israeli startup Brain.Space. This four year old Israeli startup wants to unravel the neurological impact caused by long time space travel (Read more)

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Instagram wants to make it easier to support social causes   

Instagram has been often accused of promoting narcissistic behavior among the young users. But the perception may soon get a makeover as Instagram is trying to make it easier to support social causes on its platform. According to reports, Instagram is currently testing a new feature that will give the choice to it users to support social causes including with fundraise. Instagram users can search for social causes or social movements using  hashtags (Read more)

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