The US House of Representatives&rsquo; rejection of a Bill to raise taxes on just 0.18 per cent of Americans &mdash; those making more than $1 million a year &mdash; has raised questions about the Republican-led chamber's ability to approve any plan to avert the looming &ldquo;fiscal cliff&rdquo;. Unless President Barack Obama and the Congress forge a deal in time, the economy could thrust into a recession.

Scenarios staring at Americans

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Korean pop star PSY became a worldwide phenomenon this year thanks to his Gangnam Style video going viral online. Last year, Kolaveri Di had become a national obsession &mdash; it spawned several clones in multiple languages &mdash; right through this year. Both videos can thank YouTube for raising them to cult status.

What India was watching in 2012

The summit commemorating the 20th anniversary of India&rsquo;s &ldquo;partnership&rdquo; with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or Asean, was held in New Delhi on December 20 and 21. Unusually for an occasion where so many heads of government arrived, it was kept low-key; this is all the more remarkable because its centrepiece was agreements for free trade in services and for investment. This comes &ndash; as the leaders of the Philippines and Vietnam pointed out in their speeches &ndash; when many countries in Southeast Asia are growing increasingly concerned about the sheer scale of Chinese influence in their region, and it thus has implications that go well beyond the domain of economics. As the culmination of a sustained focus on India&rsquo;s &ldquo;Look East&rdquo; policy steered by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, it is a triumph for both foreign policy management and for reformist, open economics.

The grand Eastern U-turn

LAST WEEK WE ASKED: Parliamentary panel has opposed the NCHER bill.

Student's corner

Here is a look at the states&rsquo; requests at the NDC meeting (Click on graphic)

What states want

She might not see eye to eye with the Central government on various issues but Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa wants a direct line of contact with the prime minister all the same. Before the National Development Council meeting on Thursday, Jayalalithaa sought a chair directly in front of Manmohan Singh. Sources said she wanted direct eye contact with the prime minister. As the picture shows, she got her way, but it didn&rsquo;t seem to help, since she walked out in a huff before the meeting ended, complaining that she was not given an opportunity to speak.

Eye of the storm

Protests at India Gate and Raisina Hill last weekend put five-star hotels in central Delhi on alert. Many of these hotels put up barricades at the main entrance and allowed entry to visitors coming on foot only after asking the purpose of their visit. The reason for this extra caution, it turned out, was that many protesters tried to take shelter in these hotels after the police chased them with lathis, water cannons and tear gas shells.

Protesters not allowed

This refers to the editorial &ldquo;The Russian connection&rdquo; (December 27). The Indo-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, 1971 set the foundation of India&rsquo;s cordial relations with Russia. In the light of India&rsquo;s security concern with China, India and Russia&rsquo;s friendship needs to be augmented. Nikita Khrushchev looked in a different direction when China attacked India in 1962, and said China was Russia&rsquo;s brother and India a friend. Among all good relations with Russia, the &ldquo;Gorshkhov curse&rdquo; and Khrushchev&rsquo;s statement are relevant.

Letters: Russian friendship

Apropos A K Bhattacharya&rsquo;s column &ldquo;Alliance reality dawns on Congress&rdquo; (New Delhi Diary, December 26), the meeting of minds between the Congress and the ruling government has led to the roping in of the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to approve important proposals. The behaviour of these two parties in Parliament revealed that they would bark but not bite. They opposed the foreign direct investment in multi-brand retail but abstained from, or voted in its favour, to create the fiction of the majority and save the government. Clearly, they are unlikely to trigger a Lok Sabha election before 2014 owing to political and personal considerations. After the latest Assembly elections, both the parties are concentrating on their performance in Uttar Pradesh, while their party leaders are under the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) scanner. It&rsquo;s another matter that CBI would not succumb to government pressure to clear issues against them.

Letters: The political nexus

The clause in the Companies Bill passed by the Lok Sabha earlier this month mandating that companies of a certain category (yet to be defined) have at least one woman director on their boards is unlikely to further the cause of gender diversity in the workplace. There are two linked aspects to the issue: one practical, the other social.

Directing women

The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has yet again identified 309 institutions offering courses in business management, hotel management, fashion technology, etc, without its approval.

Don't let unapproved institutes take you for a ride

The United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government has done great damage to its credibility &ndash; and, by extension, to the reputation of India internationally &ndash; by consistently being over-optimistic in its public forecasts and pronouncements. Governments should not be pessimistic. Nor should they appear to be detached from reality, especially if the economic situation is as grave as the one facing India today. Unfortunately, going by the numbers, it sometimes appears as if UPA-II is capable of ignoring not just reality but also simple arithmetic. The concern about the target for growth in the 12th Five-Year Plan, due to be discussed by the Centre and state chief ministers at the meeting of the National Development Council on Thursday, is a classic example of this problem.

Number juggling

Although India now buys its defence hardware from a range of countries in addition to Russia, the Indo-Russian defence relationship remains stronger than ever. Instead of fighter aircraft, tanks and air defence guns, Russia is now India&rsquo;s prime source for &ldquo;sub-strategic&rdquo; systems that incorporate closely guarded technologies. These include the nuclear-propelled submarine INS Chakra, which Russia has provided on a 10-year lease; the aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya; and potential access to the precision code of Russia&rsquo;s Global Navigation Satellite System. After jointly developing the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile, the two countries are joining hands to develop next-generation systems for both their militaries, like the Fifth-Generation Fighter Aircraft and the Multirole Transport Aircraft. Russia has also helped India develop its own nuclear-propelled ballistic missile submarine.

The Russian connection 

The National Development Council (NDC) meeting scheduled today is not exactly an aam aadmi show, even though the outcome might impact them eventually. But not for the Planning Commission, which is responsible for conducting the mega event. It is learnt that the commission is planning to install a giant screen in front of Yojana Bhawan to let the common man and the general public get first-hand information of the deliberations at the NDC meet and what&rsquo;s in store for them. It is worth wondering just who among the aam aadmi will find this riveting stuff.

NDC for the aam aadmi

This refers to S C Aggarwal&rsquo;s letter to the editor &ldquo;Modi&rsquo;s Gujarat&rdquo; (December 25). In accordance with Central reforms, the Gujarat State Electricity Board has learned to control power theft, and made the people prudent about on-time payment of bills. But the power board is making profits because of its focus on providing electricity to the industrial sector. Narendra Modi&rsquo;s government has not bothered much to provide power to the agricultural sector for the purpose of irrigation. If Modi actually cared for the aam aadmi, he should first reduce value-added taxes on petrol and diesel, like the Goa government. Not to forget, energy charges and unit charges are the highest in Gujarat compared to other states in India.

Letters: Power in Gujarat

Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh claims to be suffering from &ldquo;development politics&rdquo; on account of the double-digit growth the state has recorded for the past several years. Many other chief ministers, he says, feel uneasy whenever he talks about the state&rsquo;s growth and development in national forums. They do not take Chhattisgarh&rsquo;s rapid economic growth in a healthy and positive way, he adds. Which chief ministers? From the Congress- or the Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled states? Singh avoids clarifying this point.

Development politics

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh must have had cause to celebrate his &ldquo;Look East&rdquo; foreign policy after the successful Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) meeting in New Delhi last week. It marked some real progress on agreements in services and investments to complement the one on trade that was signed in 2010. This was certainly evident at the farewell lunch hosted by him and his wife at the Taj Palace hotel where the menu was presented to each guest on a lavishly embossed and painted marble plate.

Plated diplomacy

This refers to K V Rao&rsquo;s letter to the editor &ldquo;New Banks&rdquo; (December 25). The Banking Laws (Amendment) Bill will surely provide opportunities to set up new private banks in the country. In the earlier phase, when new private banks came on the scene, it was felt that the public sector bank business would dry up, and the new private banks would take over. That did not happen.

Letters: Banking on competition

This refers to Subir Roy&rsquo;s article &ldquo;How technology can help diesel subsidy&rdquo; (Value for money, December 19). Better targeting of subsidies is possible &mdash; once it is technology-enabled.

Letters: Market forces at play

This refers to the debate &ldquo;Should CAG audit PPP projects?&rdquo; (December 20). The massive provision of $1,000 billion for infrastructure in the 12th Plan &ndash; half of which will flow through public-private partnership (PPP) &ndash; needs the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) audit. Last week, The Economist noted in an article captioned ominously, &ldquo;Infrastructure in India-RIPPP&rdquo;, that 758 PPP projects worth $70 billion were under way or complete. The article also said only 40 per cent of projects followed the standard contract framework prescribed by the Central government and our banking system was grappling with dud loans related to these projects. In such a situation, not only is a CAG audit into PPP projects a must, but also an investigation on how civil servants concerned missed following the prescribed rules and allowed faulty agreements to prevail.

Letters: PPP treading on faulty lines

This refers to the editorial &ldquo;The world&rsquo;s cliff&rdquo; (December 24). It is ironical that the US produced two Nobel laureates in economics in 2012 but could not offer a solution to re-rail the economy. The US clearly cannot continue with its present economic policy that encourages &ldquo;consumerism&rdquo; and &ldquo;protectionism&rdquo;.

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