The Bombay Stock Exchange's journey from being a brokers' club to becoming a professionally managed entity seems to have got derailed once again, with a spate of resignations in the past three months.
The high salary game perhaps made sense when there was an economic boom. Now as a slowdown looms, it makes sense for all companies to take a leaf out of ICICI's book and to do a reality check.
With high investment levels fuelling much of the current GDP growth, the impact of the credit squeeze is more than a matter of academic interest.
If the global economy slows down or slips into a recession due to high oil prices, that will eventually hurt all of us.
There is no doubt the oil companies are bleeding, but the issue is whether the government should also reduce the extra taxes it gets from high oil prices.
There are many issues that will have to be resolved before the committee's recommendations can be translated into practice. First, the backlash from clubby bureaucrats from the elite all-India services will have to be dealt with. Then, the experiment with a more flexible system and variable pay based on performance should not be introduced across the board, but tried out in a dozen or two enterprises, to see how it works in practice.
The Delhi State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission's decision to fine mobile phone firm Vodafone Rs 50 lakh (Rs 5 million) for offering prizes of gold coins and a Maruti SX4 as part of a promotional scheme is something all marketers in the country would do well to pay attention to.
The political exigencies are, unfortunately, likely to overwhelm the need for undoing the damage to the agricultural credit sector. At stake, therefore, is the much-needed resurgence of the Indian agriculture.
Inflation is far too important a problem to have to rely on an inadequate and, ultimately, unreliable database for solutions.
A repo rate hike may hurt growth far more than it will help deal with an inflation rate that is already dropping.
While the finance minister is in favour of sacrificing some growth to curb inflation, the problem lies in inflation being more a supply-side than a demand-led problem.
The controversy over whether the government should mandate cooked food or pre-packaged meals at child care centres (anganwadis) and for the mid-day meal scheme in primary schools under the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) misses the wood for the trees.
In today's circumstances, however, getting people to borrow more is the last thing on the minds of financial service providers. Most of them are reeling under the weight of assets whose prices have declined precipitously because nobody in his right mind wants to buy them.
Rising geopolitical uncertainty, a falling dollar and the growing speculative interest in commodities trading will keep crude prices volatile.
With the recent issues of ill-treatment of Indian workers in US and Middle East, Indian govt is also faced with the crisis of unorganised labour in India. There are 400 million workers in the unorganised sector in India that are living in subhuman conditions, are being exploited and do not get any financial benefits either. And, they fall beyond India's stringent labour laws. Unorganised Sector Worker's Social Security Bill is riddled with loopholes and yet remains undecided.
To be fair, with the increasing terrorist threats, India's concern may not be unique. The United States, for instance, has always had the reputation of not allowing any email service provider to operate without it being able to break the encrypted code.
Budget has made provisions for increase in the discretionary powers of the taxmen. It remains to be seen whether this move will affect the taxpayers or help them better.
In recent years, as the number of government economic reports coming out in the weeks and months before the Survey has increased, its utility has diminished as a source of data and as the ministry's assessment of the state of the economy.
Apart from signalling the shape of things to come, the stock markets are seen as an important source of funds for investment - so their health can be critical.
The new Sebi chairman will have to work hard in institution building. This involves attracting high-quality people (who might often be young by government standards), putting them in a meritocratic workplace with open discussion, and establishing transparency and accountability structures so that Sebi becomes not a one-man shop but a genuine institution that will be a key player in India's GDP growth.
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