In this new era of economic growth, nations doing reasonably well, when met with extended periods of stagnation, have opted for a change in the government. If it was the US in 2008, it was the euro zone and Latin American countries later. China had a routine change but it is also trimming its political sails drastically now. India, too, must want a political change and this is where the injection of Narendra Modi into high-end national politics must seed our worries. Neither the Bharatiya Janata Party  (BJP) nor the Congress have cadre-based presence in half the Indian states; one reason the nation has been under a compulsive coalition governance for decades. The workings of a decade and more of Modi would tend to put off most of the ranking regional parties to gel together to form a government with the BJP, if it leads the Congress. If the BJP is unable to touch respectable figures on its own, the resurrection of a Third Front will loom large. A successful big leap forward by the Modi

Letters: The half leap

Business Standard

The Tamil Nadu government's decision to implement the new measure of providing mineral water to the poor at a highly subsidised price of Rs 10 is at best a superficial move aimed at easing the problem of poverty. This pronouncement reminds me of yet another welfare scheme implemented widely across Tamil Nadu. Under the garb of providing affordability to the poor struggling to meet ends in an inflationary environment, the state effectively placed a ceiling of Rs 120 on cinema ticket prices. This was done without considering the existing prohibitive business, administrative costs and the resulting losses incurred by multiplexes or the potentially deleterious effects on stakeholders - producers, directors, distributors etc.The effects of subsidising mineral water will be similar. The subsidies will have to be paid for through tax hikes or borrowing. This will mean upsetting the middle class while also risking a high fiscal deficit. The cost of welfare economics markedly outweighs its bene

Letters: Bad economics

Apropos Kanika Datta's column "Women's rights? Who cares!" (Swot, September 12), not only politicians and the government but the society at large is also oblivious of its responsibility towards women in India. This is evident by how the laws enacted to protect the rights of women are flouted in practice. Despite the Child Marriage Restraint Act, such marriages are rampant - according to a study cited in The Times of India, 40 per cent of child brides in the world live in India and 46 per cent women got married before the age of 18. The law pertaining to domestic violence has not reduced the abuses at home. The cases of Yukta Mookhey and Nandita Puri who have complained against the ill-treatment by their respective husbands - industrialist Prince Tuli and actor Om Puri, show that such atrocities are not confined to rural areas or illiterate families.Apart from the paternalistic pattern of our society, child rearing practices have also contributed to the subservient behaviour of women. G

Letters: Victims of social neglect

This refers to the report "Link between BJP's electoral plans, UP riots need probing" (September 15). B Rajeshwari has not provided any evidence to prove that whenever the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) wants to rise in a geographical sector, it engineers a communal riot. Her categorisation of riots, before India became independent, in three or four time segments is theoretical. The 1946 riots in Bengal-Bihar provinces were not started by the cries of Hindutva. Her next theory that such riots are deliberately orchestrated by the majority community is far from the reality. Riots have almost always been triggered by small sparks and not by the BJP alone because the party was not in existence in those decades. Its predecessor organisation, the Jana Sangha was not accused for such misdemeanours.The third proposition stated by her is also without any evidence. If the riots that took place after the nineties were for political and economic interests coming in conflict between two communities,

Letters: Decoding riots

The government seemed to be in overdrive to clear big-ticket investment projects last week. A Union cabinet minister from the Congress party, who has been pushing for the clearance of one such mega-scheme, enthusiastically called a briefing after the project was approved. However, the informal briefing was coincidentally scheduled on the day Narendra Modi was declared the Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate for the 2014 general elections and, as luck would have it, one of the mega-projects cleared happened to be in Modi's Gujarat. When reporters asked the minister what he made of the Gujarat angle to the project, he was quick to retort that maybe Modi will stake a claim to it. Going by that logic, if Modi ends up in the PM's chair he may just stake a claim to the entire scheme, much to the minister's chagrin.

Windfall claim

Senior leader and patriarch of the Bharatiya Janata Party L K Advani (pictured) might have been left sulking after he was ignored over Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi being nominated the BJP's prime ministerial candidate. But his website (www.lkadvani.in) still describes Advani as, "Shri L K Advani is currently the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, and the Prime Ministerial Candidate of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) for the 2009 General Elections."

Living in the past?

Although he held his first post-PM-nomination rally in Haryana, Modi could not resist taking a dig at the state's chief minister, Bhupender Singh Hooda. Working a crowd comprised heavily of ex-defence personnel, Modi said he regretted not being able to attend the Sainik School in Jamnagar because his parents couldn't afford to send him to one. He, however, could not help but mention that Hooda went to the same school. "Hooda has eaten a lot of namak of Gujarat," Modi said with a guffaw.

Salted anecdote

Now that he is the party's prime ministerial candidate, the Bharatiya Janata Party's lesser leaders are falling over themselves to heap the plaudits on Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi (pictured). At the recent rally in Rewari, Haryana, one leader compared Modi to Krishna in the Mahabharata, who would provide the country with direction; another disagreed and said Modi is Arjuna, who should now pick the bow and fight for the country. But, the recently inducted former Olympian Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore went a step further and said, "If Modi comes to power and Pakistan eyes Kashmir, then Kashmir will remain but Pakistan won't." Rathore isn't even a week old in the BJP.

Hero worship

CRISIL has analysed the sales performance of 8,500 micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) from 2009-10 to 2011-12 (refers to financial year, April 1 to March 31). The analysis reveals that the sales of enterprises in non-metropolitan cities registered steep growth of 22 per cent in 2010-11. However, the growth trajectory got moderated in the subsequent year, 2011-12, to 15.1 per cent. Comparatively, sales of MSMEs in the 8 metropolitan cities of Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Pune grew by 5.4 per cent in 2010-11. They registered growth of 9.6 percent in the following year, 2011-12.Despite volatility in the overall economic environment with heightened concerns on high inflation and high rate of interest in the last couple of years, MSMEs in the non-metro locations continued their growth march, albeit with a moderated trajectory. On the other hand, enterprises in the metro locations    continued to move up from their relatively lower pace of gr

Resilient MSMEs in small cities face growth moderation

RBI should remove hurdles faced by mobile payments

A silver bullet

Next monetary policy review must return to basics

Focus on transparency

In August 2012, these exports stood at $4.58 billion, according to the data provided by the Engineering Export Promotion Council

Engineering exports turn positive in August

The long-delayed declaration that Narendra Modi will be the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP's) candidate for prime minister had a certain air of inevitability about it. But the last-minute drama should not take away from the plain fact that, in naming Mr Modi, the BJP has merely acknowledged that it has in him a politician of rare skill and charisma - of a degree unseen in national politics perhaps since Indira Gandhi.

Does Narendra Modi's rise bring back memories of Indira Gandhi?

Every Monday, Business Standard analyses one family's finances and suggests a suitable way forward

Case study

StatsGuru-16-September-2013

A price index for agri commodities: A Business Standard and Indicus Analytics initiative

Indicus price monitor

Policy uncertainty, the received wisdom goes, is the key reason Indian businessmen prefer to locate their investments overseas - including in Africa - rather than in India. Jindal Steel and Power Ltd chief Naveen Jindal added a new deterrent to the list: the office of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG). Under investigation following a CAG report for irregularities in coal mines allocated to it by the government, Jindal told reporters in Raigarh that he planned to set up power plants in Africa because there was no fear of CAG nor a coal scandal in countries there. What is more, he added, investors were given red-carpet treatment and assistance in those countries, the unspoken sub-text being that India didn't offer similar treatment to prospective investors.

CAG gag

Going by the dictum that anything sells in the name of Rahul Gandhi, an NGO that calls itself "Rahul Gandhi ka Bharat" has instituted a "Rahul Gandhi National Award for Excellence in Media." Asked about it, Rahul Gandhi's office, however stated it had "no connection with this award and had nothing to do with this organisation". Going by the level of adulation people have for "netas", several such organisations exist in the name of the Gandhi scion and even of Congress President Sonia Gandhi. While the organisation, as evident from its website, dedicates itself to chronicling Rahul Gandhi and his activities, its webpage acknowledges it can be "accuse(d) us of sycophancy". What is significant is that several Congress legislators such as Mahabal Mishra, Kamal Kishor, both Lok Sabha MPs, are listed as patrons. Mishra, who figures in its picture gallery as being part of earlier award ceremonies, said he could have attended as chief guest in the past but had nothing to do with the organisati

Rahul's self-confessed sycophants

Has enough been done to prevent another crisis?

Lehman plus five

Mobile ad spend is set to soar on the back of increasing affluence of the Indian middle class

The mobile marketplace

Can travel policies be extended?Only those policies which are active and purchased for a period of at least 30 days can be extended. Also, to be eligible for extension, there should have been no claim made by you in that policy period.For how many days can these be extended?Such policies can be extended just once and only up to a maximum of 180 days. The total policy period including the extension should not exceed 360 days. The premium payable towards extending a policy has to be paid before the actual extension comes into effect

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