With its rich experience in offshore services and an enviable talent pool to boot, India is one of the most sought-after offshoring destinations. As international firms are focusing on lowering costs, there has been a flow of offshoring, especially of non-critical roles,to low-cost nations. According to US-based Hackett Group Inc, North American and European companies will move 750,000 jobs in IT, finance and other business services to India and other low-cost nations by 2016. Here  is a SWOT analysis of India:

India as an offshoring destination

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Inadequate response to asylum request from Mr Snowden

Moral and realistic

The sector can afford no more regulatory disruptions

Take care of telecom

This refers to the editorial Licence to be cautious (July 4). If the Reserve Bank of Indias real motive is financial inclusion, then the need for inviting new applicants is irrational. We have an almost saturated banking industry. New allotments would not solve the problem of financial inclusion in totality, as new organisations will take time to settle, including facing the greater challenge of rural customers.On the contrary, Post Bank of India with its deep roots in the country can be asked to partner one of the existing banks having clear ambitions to multiply money on rural soil. This would keep the wheel moving with less time to stabilise and minimal resources.Faith and professionalism are a critical mix that financial inclusion requires and that needs to be served best with experienced bankers rather than freshers.Prem Agarwal  MumbaiLetters can be mailed, faxed or e-mailed to:The Editor, Business StandardNehru House, 4 Bahadur Shah Zafar MargNew Delhi 110 002Fax: (011) 23720201

Letters: Rural banking push

Apropos the editorial Line of warning (July 3), a 2003 European study of the anatomy and ambition of over 300 mega projects in 30 countries describes malaise such as the one experienced in the Delhi Metro public-private partnership deal.It tells us how in mega-rail projects, the costs are underestimated and traffic projections overestimated with a view to getting the project approved. They conclude that the cost estimates used in public debates, media coverage and decision-making for transport infrastructure development are highly, systematically and significantly deceptive and so are the cost benefit analysis in to which cost estimates are routinely fed, to calculate the viability and ranking of projects.Such misrepresentation of costs is likely to lead to the misallocation of scarce resources, which in turn would produce losers among those financing and using infrastructure, be they taxpayers or private investors. It also illustrated with a US case where the actual ridership was 28 t

Letters: PPP perils

Apropos the report UPA govt takes ordinance route to food security (July 4), the urgency to promulgate an ordinance when the Bill is before the House, is not to feed the starving but to satisfy the ruling coalitions appetite for votes. Agricultural policies, including the procurement of agriculture products, their storage, supply chain network and public distribution system (PDS), have completely failed to benefit farmers or consumers. It is still not clear how the government proposes to meet the increased needs of proper storage and supply. Unless the infrastructure and an efficient PDS are put in place, this security will remain only on paper. The move is purely a political one to put the state and the next government in a Catch-22 position.N Ramamurthy  ChennaiLetters can be mailed, faxed or e-mailed to:The Editor, Business StandardNehru House, 4 Bahadur Shah Zafar MargNew Delhi 110 002Fax: (011) 23720201E-mail: letters@bsmail.inAll letters must have a postal address and telephone n

Letters: An appetite for votes

After stakeholders in the domestic aviation industry, Bollywood actors now might have to be on their guard too from AirAsias India entry. On Wednesday, AirAsia group chief Tony Fernandes tweeted a picture of Mittu Chandilya, the youthful chief executive offcier of the India operations, with Bollywood actor John Abraham and asked, Who is better looking?, an oblique reference to Chandilyas pin-up looks, which the local media has often commented on.

Photo finish

From being the poster boy of infrastructure development about seven years ago, the public-private partnership (PPP) model has become an embarrassment of missed deadlines, broken promises and worse. How to handle the image problems that crop up as a result? A major corporate player that infamously backed out of a PPP project has worked out a response of sorts. Every evening at around seven its communication team calls journalists to ask, Anything new you are writing about us?

The write stuff

Lawyers defending those accused in the Pawan Bansal-related bribes-for-Railway-posts scandal have been arguing for interim bail for their clients until the court takes formal cognisance of the chargesheet that has been filed against them. The judge hearing the pleas offered a unique reason not to grant it. Describing herself as a soft-hearted person, she told the lawyers, Main ek baar kisi ko bahar bula ke kam hi andar bhejti hoon (if I allow someone out of jail I rarely send them back in again). Which could be considered an elegant way of not providing relief for the accused.

Soft power

I do not think Mallya's involved: Saroj Poddar

Amartya Sen forgets the system does not work in half the countryThe Ordinance for the food Bill would be a political shot in the arm for the government. In fact, the government doesn't even need to pass the Bill in the next six months as they can always re-promulgate the ordinance. I don't agree with Amartya Sen who recently said food security should come, even as an ordinance, if not as a law. While the ordinance will help the UPA government, Sen and Jean Dreze (development economist, who recently quit the National Advisory Council) forget that the system does not work in half the country. Their arguments in favour of a law even before correcting the system is based on assumptions that if states such as Kerala and Tamil Nadu can work their systems well, others too can. N C Saxena (National Advisory Council member) in a study has talked about a single woman in Uttar Pradesh having 400 ration cards. Imagine the impact of this on large quantities of cheap food grain. The Ordinance also r

Food Bill Ordinance: Expert Take

The top five deals this year accounted for 42.54% of the total investment in terms of deal value

A Snapshot of pe activity & deals

New banks will mean the RBI must improve oversight

Licence to be cautious

Again, the PM failed to check an errant 'ally'

Bilateral problems

The son of missing parents in the Kedarnath valley had given the local administration details about them and added his own number as a contact number in case any information was received. A few days later, somebody from the government called the son's number and asked, "Bhai, tu zinda hai kya?" (Brother, are you alive?). First, they don't make a proper effort to rescue people then they harass people like this, the son rued before he gave the official an earful and disconnected.

'Are you alive?'

The virtual world appears to have politicians of all hues in its grip - witness the twitter battles between the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party over the rescue operations in Uttarakhand - and All India Congress Committee General Secretary Digvijaya Singh seems to be one of its most faithful acolytes. At the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee meeting in Bangalore, on his maiden visit after taking charge of the party's affairs in the state, he didn't seem to have any interest in the proceedings or in what the chief minister or railway minister were saying in their speeches. Instead, he was seen to be in deep communion with his mobile phone, either texting or perhaps checking what's being said in the social media. At any rate, that underlined the popular perception that politicians operate on another plane.

Virtual concerns

This is the age of wacky mobile phones with wackier ringtones but like the accessories you choose to wear, they make a statement about the owner. As a senior bureaucrat discovered, personal eccentricities may not go down well in the hallowed portals of officialdom. As Anil Goswami took charge of his job as home secretary, his mobile started ringing and the ringtone was a salacious whistle. A junior officer immediately alerted him that given the sensitivities involved with his department he should change the ringtone, which Goswami promptly did.

A question of tone

This refers to the Sukumar Mukhopadhyay's article "Adjournment should not be used to cause delay" (Expert Eye, July 1). The Bombay High Court in the case of the Commissioner of Central Excise versus Techno Economic Services Private Ltd has rightly observed that despite engaging many advocates, adjournments are sought, which result in payment of heavy professional charges to the advocates. Advocates are the main impediments in the early disposal of cases. They mint money by taking too many adjournments to prolong the cases. They do not collect professional charges by cheque or demand drafts or by credit to their account to avoid taxes. Only cash payment is accepted. The government should allot a certain time frame to the judges to deliver judgments. Granting adjournments on frivolous grounds has been the main cause of delay. The delay in civil suits is all the more pronounced.Frequent adjournments not only contribute to the swelling number of cases pending in courts but also places the

Letters: Adjournment havoc

This refers to the report "PM sets ambitious infrastructure targets" (June 29). I strongly feel that instead of another announcement or awarding of infrastructure projects, the government should direct the Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure to work speedily on clearing the stalled projects worth Rs 10 lakh crore. This amount is 10 times the Rs 115,000-crore projects announced by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.The government should understand that the industry has been "bruised" due to the delay in clearances and red tape and not lack of investment opportunities.Anand Wadadekar  PuneLetters can be mailed, faxed or e-mailed to:The Editor, Business StandardNehru House, 4 Bahadur Shah Zafar MargNew Delhi 110 002Fax: (011) 23720201E-mail: letters@bsmail.inAll letters must have a postal address and telephone number

Letters: No more stalled projects

Apropos the report, "Telecom Commission nod to 100% FDI in telecom" (July 3), of course, the move to allow 49 per cent foreign direct investment to come through the automatic route and the rest with after the approval of the Foreign Investment Promotion Board is welcome. But the government should also bring in tax reforms, such as introducing a proper Direct Taxes Code.Jacob Sahayam  ThiruvananthapuramLetters can be mailed, faxed or e-mailed to:The Editor, Business StandardNehru House, 4 Bahadur Shah Zafar MargNew Delhi 110 002Fax: (011) 23720201E-mail: letters@bsmail.inAll letters must have a postal address and telephone number

Letters: Tax reforms needed

Do you think B-schools should rationalise fees to become affordable for needy students

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