Two newspaper articles recently caught my attention. The first quotes the father who killed his daughter and her boyfriend in the Rohtak district of Haryana for eloping as saying, “Whatever I did was right and for honour. If others also follow the same path, such things (love marriages) won’t take place.” The other article points out that more Dalits are marrying out of caste,
If Rahul Gandhi’s gate-crashing into Congress’s own Ideas Inc department, and saying his government was wrong in trying to save convicted MPs and MLAs through an ordinance, were moves that eventually strips Lalu Prasad Yadav of his membership in Lok Sabha, Lalu’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) is not making the displeasure public as yet. Call it political co
Everything was going all right with the world, a nation breathing in the supreme court’s verdict on a citizen’s right to reject the criminals masquerading as smiling poster boys of political parties out to do all that is good for you and at the same time hyperventilating on the need for the country’s president to reject autographing an ordinance that rejects the apex court&rsq
The QS World University Rankings are out. We as a nation have drawn a blank again when it comes to the top 200 – as in previous years. That is no great news; we may reflect something like this: It is an annual feature and who knows how much of this information comes to us doctored or based on parameters that do not s
What are the roles available for the political class in times of rioting? Political leaders can be expected to instigate riots, propagate rumours, mobilise mobs, indulge in blame game, and manage post-riot relief and compensation. Are they expected to stop riots, and heal wounds? No. That would be too idealistic. When rioting is on, the mob is in such animalistic frenzy that it would be foolhar
Reserve Bank of India governor Raghuram Rajan is all set to make his debut monetary policy statement on Friday. With the US Federal Reserve’s welcome announcement to continue with its bond buying stimulus package and the rupee recovering, markets are expecting the governor to withdraw some of the measures that his predecessor undertook to check the outflow of funds. Despite some s
That Miss America Nina Davuluri would not be able to become a Bollywood actress because the producer would prefer a fair girl over her due to market demands is giving the market too much credit. Too much credit for being too fair and for acting on forces outside of itself. The market does not work on an already created need, affinity or both but has mechanisms to create its own. `If you
The All India Students Association (AISA) won all four central panel seats in Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) students union elections again this year. Besides a slight aberration last year, when the JNUSU president`s post when to the Democratic Student`s Forum (DSF), a breakaway group of the CPI(M)-affiliated Students’ Federation of India (SFI) formed that year itself, this is pretty m
India’s current account deficit (CAD) hitting a record high of 4.8% in July and the continuous simultaneous steady plunging of the rupee, which has not bottomed out yet, has become a major source of worry for the country. The depreciation of the rupee (15% against the dollar since January) will result in the cost of future import of goods such as petroleum, coal, and non-essential
At the Times of India, where I began my career in business journalism in early 1992, we were called “commerce desk”. The description emanated from the obsolete pre-liberalisation context when even a top newspaper would have only two-three semi-retired folks tracking India’s economic story; one dedicated to reprinting stock quotes from a list telexed by Bombay S
Janmashtami heralds the start of the unrelenting festive season—from now until the end of the year, the spate of festivals includes Ganesh Chaturthi and the multiple Visarjan days, the Navratris, Dusshera, Diwali, Eid, Christmas and New Years (and I’m sure I’m forgetting a few). Though I look upon the impending traffic snarls, deafening cacophony of music and crackers, and bur
The real estate sector is in choppy waters and the RBI’s move is being seen as an attempt to shield the country’s banking structure from grave risks such schemes pose to the financial health of banks. At present, a large number of real estate companies use such schemes to lure buyers. In the 80:20 scheme, for instance, a buyer pays 20 percent of the value of t
All public services are paid for by individual citizens, either directly or indirectly, through taxes. Therefore, they have every right to expect high quality service. That’s why citizen’s charter is important. We have seen nearly two decades of struggle towards implementation of the citizen’s charter. Till 1996, the citizen’s charter was unknown to government de
If any of you woke up this morning to book train tickets for Diwali for a vacation back home, this blog might be catharsis. You logged in to irctc.co.in at 8 am to book your tickets – not for anything but lack of choice – and waited till 8.30 am to see the face of the `plan my travel` page, only to realise that all tickets have been booked and your favourite train is showing the sta
As the rupee continues to hit new lows, economists and corporate honchos continue to predict deteriorating economic performance and politicians continue to fight over reforms like there is no tomorrow, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has recommended revamping the banking structure to further strengthen the backbone of our economy. The apex bank has reiterated the need to seriously and u
The way the political administrations in multiple states are treating Asaram ‘Bapu’, the self-claimed godman/spiritual guru who is alleged to have sexually assaulted a teenager, has given rise to several questions. About not only law enforcement but also law implementation. We live in a democracy that believes in the rule of law. So why is Asaram being treated above law?
Public Money, Private Agenda: The Use And Abuse Of MPLADS By A Surya Prakash Rupa, Rs 395 In the 1970s, corporators of the then Bombay Municipal Corporation (BMC) gave themselves Rs 50,000 a year. Their idea was that each one of them must have these monies over and above their collective control over the BMC budgets. This they could spend on works that caug
The union government is reportedly contemplating changes to the provisions of suspension and transfers of members of all-India services created under Article 312 of the constitution so as to make prior consent of the union government mandatory. In the context of the recent controversy about the suspension of Durga Shakti Nagpal and half a dozen instances of harassment of well-meaning, young and
We talk of social accountability and inclusive democracy through well informed participation; we vouch for facilitating the ideals of transparency and inclusiveness. And yet we don’t pass the Jan Lok Pal bill, instead we make provisions for curtailing the scope of an existing Act by putting across the Right to Information (Amendment) bill with a pace rarely seen otherwise, despite innumer
With the economy on a downswing, entrepreneurial opportunities for young and seasoned innovators alike have got further squeezed. Not that the situation was very rosy to begin with, for there was hardly any fund even earlier to invest in creative ideas of students, self-employed people or professionals who had the big ideas, and sometime even the proof of concept that could make a difference.&n
