Best of BS Opinion: Coupling of power exchanges, regulatory overkill & more

Here's a selection of Business Standard opinion pieces for the day

The pandemic pain is likely to be enduring for the Indian economy, and the latest study of state finances by the RBI — released on Tuesday — underscored some of the challenges. According to the study, the gross fiscal deficit of state governments is likely to go beyond 4 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) in the current year under the baseline scenario, and revenues would remain under pressure over the next few years. In this context, our lead editorial notes that government finances are likely to be a drag on economic growth. According to the International Monetary Fund, India’s public debt is likely to expand to about 90 per cent of GDP.
 

Other opinion pieces talk about higher capital adequacy for brokerages and power trading. 
 

Even under global stress during the so-called subprime crisis in 2008, India’s financial markets continued to run smoothly. This speaks volumes for the efficiency of the exchanges and also for the prudence of the market regulator. It also implies there is relatively little need to tighten norms. Raising margins as well as raising capital adequacy norms by the regulator may be an overkill, argues our second editorial
 

The implementation of Market Coupling as proposed by CERC in the Draft CERC (Power Market) Regulations, 2020, would ensure a truly competitive Pareto efficient multiple Power Exchange model and will lead to benefits in terms of innovation and better services, writes Kirit S Parikh

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“The 5G ecosystem is yet to develop here and the prices are very high and we can’t afford them.” 

Bharti Airtel CEO Gopal Vittal