From small restaurants to mighty software companies, it is businesses, not the government, that create jobs. Yet, in a cruel irony, they have to fight extortive and brutal State power every step of the way, says Debashis Basu.
Dinesh Vazirani on how he built Saffronart into an institution.
'Modi is likely to make more announcements to win or retain popularity, and put himself at the centre of things even more than now,' says T N Ninan.
Uttam Ghosh's tongue-in-cheek look at the latest Bollywood-politics bonhomie
The Union Cabinet has approved amendments to the General Insurance Business (Nationalisation) Act, paving the way for privatisation of government-owned insurers. The amendments, approved by Cabinet, will remove the clause for the Centre to hold at least 51 per cent in public sector insurance companies at any given time. It will also have an enabling provision for the transfer of management control from the government to the potential buyer of the public sector insurance company. The finance ministry will move amendments to the insurance Act in the ongoing Parliament session.
A chunk of divestment till now has come from follow-on offerings in the Centre's two ETFs, Bharat-22 and CPSE. Now, there will be initial public offerings of Mazagon Docks, rail companies RVNL and IRFC and MSTC.
Are our ministers having fun at our expense? Any other explanation would suggest 'we are ruled by men whose judgement you cannot trust and whose grasp of reality is questionable,' says Karan Thapar.
'Given that he would have a good understanding of how many jobs the economy can create at the moment, was Modi hailing the modest pakoda-seller to infuse some charm in self-employment?' asks Udit Misra.
'Anything other than a complete, 2014-style victory will be far more devastating for him then it would be for anyone else.' 'Disciplining restive party members, and taming recalcitrant allies will then be far more difficult for him,' says Mihir S Sharma.
Our last mile delivery stood out, she said, and promised that programmes will be accelerated and red tape will be reduced.
In 2020-2021, the amount of foreign direct investment into India from China and Hong Kong plummeted to just $200 million -- its lowest in the recent past. In the first half of 2021-2022, FDI investments through these two nations stood at just $36 million.
Crorepatis' income rose by a staggering 40% between 2015-2016 and 2017-2018.
'A balanced head plus heart approach would be a full opening up of the economy including manufacturing and internal travel in the country but excluding COVID-19 hotspots,' recommends Jaimini Bhagwati.
Narendra Modi is set to address a huge political rally in Lucknow in poll-bound Uttar Pradesh on Monday, January 2. The PM is expected to make some big announcements at the rally, his first after the 50-day deadline on demonetisation curbs expires. Utkarsh Mishra imagines what Modi will say at the rally, dubbed as Lucknow's 'biggest ever.'
India's work participation rate is lower than Pakistan and Bangladesh. Are Indians lazy? No, there are no jobs, asserts Aakar Patel.
'Nationalism built on divisiveness cannot strengthen the country, or help the economy improve its performance,' points out T N Ninan.
For the past, blame the Congress. For the present, blame the Congress. For everything, blame the Congress. But for your future, vote BJP.
'AAP achieved what it wanted. The BJP achieved what it wanted, a 'Congress mukht Delhi,' and the Congress also achieved what it wanted, which was to keep the BJP out of power.'
'Event management can distract from, but not permanently mask, execution failures,' points out Rathin Roy, director, National Institute of Public Finance and Policy.
The Union Cabinet has cleared a proposal to provide Rs 30,600 crore government guarantee for security receipts issued by the National Asset Reconstruction Company (NARCL) as part of resolution of bad loans, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Thursday. The proposed bad bank or NARCL will pay up to 15 per cent of the agreed value for the loans in cash and the remaining 85 per cent would be government-guaranteed security receipts. The government guarantee would be invoked if there is loss against the threshold value.
Axis Bank was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rallying over 6 per cent, followed by HDFC, IndusInd Bank, TCS, Asian Paints, Titan, HCL Tech and ICICI Bank. On the other hand, ONGC, Bajaj Finance, NTPC, M&M and Reliance Industries were among the laggards.
Uttam Ghosh asks the prime minister and his government why the Rohingya are a threat to our country.
'If such is the ambition to effect change, India is a platform where an innovation can be tested on a scale unavailable in most places. To take the simplest example, where else are hundreds of millions in one country waiting for Internet access, for better broadband, for 4G roll out -- millions of them in each of these categories -- of the ascending scale?'
Axis Bank was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, surging around 7 per cent, followed by Ultratech Cement, L&T, ICICI Bank, SBI, M&M and Bajaj Finance. On the other hand, Nestle India, Sun Pharma, Bharti Airtel and HUL ended in the red.
What could be more uncertain than Virat Kohli's agonising wait for a century for over two years? Perhaps it's what you will pay tomorrow morning to fill your vehicle's tank. Pump prices have joined cricket scores as the country's favourite discussion topic. Steep increases invite widespread protests, while moderate additions make the government anti-reformist. The ongoing fuel price conundrum is no different.
UltraTech Cement was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rising around 3 per cent, followed by TCS, Reliance Industries, HCL Tech, Infosys and Kotak Bank. Nifty rose for the sixth consecutive day, up 37.20 points or 0.28 per cent to 13,392.95.
While overall employment rose from 456 mn to 463 mn between FY11 and FY15, with farm employment falling by 26 mn over the same period, the net addition to employment over the entire four year period was a mere 7 mn.
Bharti Airtel was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rising around 4 per cent, followed by Tech Mahindra, HDFC, Kotak Bank, M&M and HCL Tech. NSE Nifty advanced 21.85 points to 16,280.10.
It will benefit about 48.34 lakh central government employees and 65.26 lakh pensioners.
'The arrests of Sanatan Sanstha members for committing murder and stockpiling explosives with the alleged intent of committing mass murder must be embarrassing to a majoritarian government,' notes Devangshu Datta.
'The book has immense value because it reveals the inner workings of the think-tank which appears to provide facts and insights to Modi, though he himself takes the final decisions and articulates them in his characteristic rhetorical style,' says Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
The talk of governance reforms at public-sector banks seems to remain on paper, as a majority of them continue to be working with just a handful board members. Half of the board seat at these banks have been vacant. Ten of the 12 public-sector banks, even large ones like Punjab National Bank, Canara Bank and Union Bank of India - all except State Bank of India (SBI) and Bank of Baroda - don't even have a chairman. In 2014, while splitting the post of chairman & managing director (CMD), the government had decided to appoint non-executive chairmen at these banks. SBI, which has an executive chairman and four managing directors, was an exception.
This will violate the time-honoured convention that a government elected for a five-year tenure presents only five full Budgets, but the NDA government will no doubt present it as yet another initiative of Mr Modi.
Investments through participatory notes (P-notes) in the Indian capital market rose to Rs 91,658 crore at February-end, making it the highest level in 33 months, suggesting growing confidence of overseas investors. P-notes are issued by registered foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) to overseas investors who wish to be part of the Indian stock market without registering themselves directly. They, however, need to go through a due diligence process. According to Sebi data, the value of P-note investments in Indian markets -- equity, debt and hybrid securities - increased to Rs 91,658 crore in February-end from Rs 84,916 crore at January-end.
In a first, the Comptroller and Auditor General's (CAG) officers reached out to several ministries in the last week of April as part of a confidence-boosting measure. The meeting brought the CAG officials and those from the ministries across the table to discuss the pain points in their relations. CAG of India Girish Chandra Murmu took this novel step because of growing tensions between those audited and the auditor.
Out of nearly 30 public sector undertakings and assets under 'strategic sale' plan, only the ONGC-HPCL plan has been completed
Rogue lending under political influence was rife in the Congress-led regime and is not happening in the Modi regime, certainly not on that scale. But if PSBs cannot lend as indiscriminately as they did last time in the name of 'credit expansion', how well will these banks do, asks Debashis Basu.
Sitharaman said surcharges on individuals having taxable income of Rs 2 crore to Rs 5 crore; and Rs 5 crore and more have been raised.
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