The problem with India's growth story has been its inability to reduce poverty to significant levels.
The issuance of identification numbers, which will be a demand-driven endeavour and will be issued on a voluntary basis, will help in plugging leakages in transfer of benefits under government welfare programmes.
The cash-starved Indian textile industry is of the view that the Technology Upgradation Fund Scheme, or Tufs, flagship scheme of the textiles ministry, has lost its shine, as economic slowdown has put modernisation and expansion plans of companies on hold. The industry says there are more basic problems that the government needs to address.
Food security for all was a poll promise from the ruling Congress party before this year's general elections.
Mobile phone manufacture in India started only in 2006.
To be out by October, it reflects weight of components in GDP.
State-owned enterprises are depending more on government money to fund their capital expansion in the wake of the economic downturn.
Companies can sigh with relief. The draft rules of the Collection of Statistics Act, cleared by Parliament earlier this year, neutralise some of the powers given to data collecting officials.
The services sector contributes the highest of around 54 per cent to the country's gross domestic product. At present, the WPI, which is released every week, contains prices of primary articles, fuel and manufactured products. Data from banking and transport services would be the first sectors to be covered on an experimental basis. The plan is to initially build a separate services index, which would be integrated into the WPI later.
Since September last year, when everyone realised that the global economic meltdown could not be wished away, industry groups have been dishing out data on job losses. Among these is the Confederation of Indian Textile Industry, which said a million jobs had been lost in the last financial year. Most textile companies expect the situation to improve by October this year.
India Inc's initiative to adopt Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) across the country is facing problems because of low level of cooperation on the field as well as red-tapism, industry lobby groups have claimed.
Ficci: Rationalise tax structure; CII: Space for fiscal incentives is limited.
A higher cumulative penalty will be levied for not sharing data, say officials. However, criminal charges will be pressed in cases where manipulation of data is involved, they say. Under the new Act, people or companies not divulging data would have to pay a fine of Rs 1,000 and they would be given a 14 day notice period to comply. If the information is not provided even after two weeks, the penalty will rise to Rs 5,000 per day.
The Model Code of Conduct for the ongoing Lok Sabha elections has come in the way of release of routine economic data like the consumer price indices.
To counter demand contraction in key markets like the US and Europe, Indian textile exporters are exploring alternative markets like Japan, South Africa and Latin America. At present, only 4 per cent of India's textile exports go to these markets.
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