Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
According to some media reports the Delhi BRICS summit, fourth for the original grouping with Brazil, Russia, India and China as its members, and the second since South Africa was co-opted at Sanya, did not set the Yamuna River (in New Delhi, where it was held on 29 March) on fire. The outcomes were perceived by some as below expectations.
Expectations have been high since the Sanya summit, hosted by China last year, which generated unprecedented media hype and high-voltage atmospherics. Read more…
Authors: Rajiv Kumar and Soumya Kanti Ghosh, FICCI
The prevalence of malnutrition in India is a cause for serious concern.
In order to eliminate this problem, a food subsidy bill (FSB) has been proposed. But the fiscal viability of the proposed FSB is unclear and the delivery outcomes could be highly compromised given current weaknesses in governance and the ineffective delivery mechanisms in place. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
The Luddites have won for the moment, with their recent protests following the Indian government’s decision to allow FDI in the retail sector.
A mere 10 million owners of traditional and self-organised retail and wholesale trade have held a country of 1.2 billion people to ransom and thwarted progress. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
For the foreseeable future at least, India will meet the majority of its energy demand with fossil fuels.
Renewable energy does not yet offer effective substitutes for oil in transport and power generation, despite marked improvements in hybrid transport technology and the steep decline of photovoltaic panel prices. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
Pakistan’s decision to grant India most favoured nation (MFN) trading status opens up many potential benefits for both countries; existing trade arrangements will be improved and new opportunities will emerge as bilateral trade is normalised.
At present, a great deal of trade occurs via Dubai, a situation which is inefficient and fraught with illegalities effectively functioning as behind-the-border barriers to trade. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
The Pakistan Commerce Minister’s recent visit to India, along with nearly 80 business delegates and high-ranking officials, will hopefully provide the platform from which commercial relations between India and Pakistan move into a higher trajectory.
This visit comes after three-and-a-half decades and follows a very successful round of meetings between the two Commerce Secretaries in Islamabad in April this year. These developments have, for once, taken the external observers of South Asia by surprise. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
The Supreme Court of India seems to have created a crisis after imposing a large-scale ban on iron ore mining in the Bellary district of Karnataka.
Although the Supreme Court has subsequently allowed the public sector entity National Mineral Development Corporation to continue operations, its imposition of a ban on iron ore mining in Bellary remains an extreme step. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, ICCI
Anna Hazare’s movement against corruption in India confronts the government and threatens immobilisation of the parliamentary process.
There are those who see this state of affairs as the consequence of some kind of foreign plot. Maybe not; but I wonder if those who see foreign influence on Anna Hazare’s movement realise how close they are to the truth. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI, New Delhi
The recent pilot’s strike in Air India has once again brought into focus the state of India’s public sector enterprises.
An Air India board member has suggested that not much is gained by apportioning blame at this stage because the patient is already suffering from cancer. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar. FICCI, New Delhi
A recent world-wide survey of popular support for capitalism reveals that 67 per cent of the Chinese strongly support their variety of capitalism.
The delicious irony is that China has emerged as capitalism’s saviour! Surprisingly, in the US, the holy land of free market capitalism only 43 per cent (if my memory serves me right) were positive about capitalism and this has declined perceptibly in the last five years. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI, New Delhi
The corruption that has been corroding India’s economic and political system over the decades now threatens to derail the India growth story. It has perhaps already become systemic and according to the pessimists the rot is so deep and widespread that it is beyond repair.
Such pessimism, I think, is both undesirable and also unwarranted. While the rot is undoubtedly extensive and seriously damaging to brand India, it can still be reversed and the system saved from its pernicious impact.
Today we are free from the earlier forms of petty corruption that characterised nearly all aspects of daily life in India. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI, New Delhi
Last year has indeed been a rollercoaster year for India. The high point has been India securing a firm place on the high table of global governance.
The process started with the G-20 summit in November 2008 and culminated in the second half of this year that saw the heads of government of all five Security Council members visiting Delhi. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
Bihar’s election results have come as a ray of sunshine amidst the gloom cast by the sordid saga of large scale, brazen and meticulously planned corruption that has emerged recently in India. With television channels competing for viewership through ever more damaging exposes of systemic corruption, the image of the entire Indian political class, at all levels, has been severely damaged.
The people are now clearly ranged against corruption, and the competitive media, having tasted blood in earlier cases like Jessica Lal, Nitish Katara and Rathore, is doggedly following corruption cases. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, ICRIER
Agriculture has emerged as the key constraint to achieving rapid growth and improving equity in India. It is also clear that while land, the principal productive asset, is almost entirely under private ownership, the sector is characterised by extensive government intervention and a visible lack of large-scale corporate investment.
As a result of insufficient investment, the agricultural sector – except perhaps in the Punjab, Haryana and the Terai region of Uttar Pradesh – remains backward. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, ICRIER
If the joint committee established to regulate the financial sector threatens to erode the credibility and autonomy of the Reserve Bank of India, the Multi-Commodity Exchange-Stock Exchange’s (MCX-SX) appeal against the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) should be seen as an attempt to undo possible regulatory capture. The MCX-SX asserts it has fulfilled all the SEBI conditions for conducting business in equities and other instruments.
Financial sector regulation has been in the news recently, and not for the right reasons. Read more…
