The Director General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) has made domestic sourcing costlier for the holders of Export Promotion Capital Goods (EPCG) licenses/authorisations.


DGFT makes domestic sourcing costlier

Business Standard

Irked by the Centre&rsquo;s environmental hurdles to investments in Orissa, the savvy CM is now steering a course of confrontation.

Project bumps slow Patnaik's political juggernaught

With Hari Shankar Brahma joining as election commissioner last month, many wondered whether the road from the ministry of power leads to Nirvachan Sadan, the office housing the powerful managers of elections in the country. When Anil Razdan retired as power secretary in 2008, his name too did the rounds as a possible election commissioner. However, it was only his successor in the ministry, VS Sampath, who ultimately got the job.

BS People: Hari Shankar Brahma, election commissioner

It would be tempting to describe him as a seat-warmer. How else do you explain the appointment last week of Anugraha Narayan Tiwari as chief information commissioner for just three months? The rules do not permit an information commissioner to serve for more than a five-year aggregate term, or until they turn 65. The IAS officer from the 1969 batch of the Andhra Pradesh cadre completes five years and reaches the age of 65 in December.

BS People: Anugraha Narayan Tiwari

There&rsquo;s a change of guard at the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). K Vijay Kumar is scheduled to take charge as director-general today.

BS People: K Vijay Kumar

Anup K Pujari, the new director-general of foreign trade, is not your quintessential bureaucrat. Chances are he will pick up the phone himself if his secretary doesn&rsquo;t after two rings. He makes it a point to switch off lights and fans whenever he steps out for a meeting, even for a few minutes. And, he hardly turns on the do-not-disturb red light outside his North Block cabin.

BS People: Anup Pujari

Despite revised norms, the compensation package for farmers who lose land is usually just a tiny fraction of the entire project cost.

The state as real estate agent for Corporate India

The much-vaunted GST will reform India&rsquo;s complex indirect tax system, while maintaining the balance of power between the Centre and states.

A federal tax structure's footprints on the sands

Dismal ridership figures and eroding profitability could turn this showcase transit project into a white elephant.

Delhi Metro's tunnel without a light

Regulations governing Indian companies were introduced in 1850, during the British Raj. They were overhauled in 1913 and 1956. Upon the recommendations of various committees, including Joshi Committee and Irani Committee, the Companies Act 1956 was re-examined periodically.

Governance for tomorrow

The new Companies Bill, 2009, which is now before Parliament, has several features that would impact positively the business climate in India.

Quote martial: Recommendations not good enough

CORPORATE GOVERNANCE
# Separation of offices of chairman and chief executive officer
# Panel to evaluate and recommend independent directors and non-executive and executive directors
# Specify number of companies in which an individual may become a director
# Fix attributes for independent directors &amp; provision for a detailed Certificate of Independence
# Fix tenure for independent directors
# Remuneration committee to determine, recommend and monitor principles, criteria and the basis of a company&rsquo;s remuneration policy
# Board to affirm and disclose in its report to members about critical risk management policy for the company
# Evaluation of performance of board of directors, committees thereof and of individual directors
# Board to place systems to ensure compliance with laws
# New responsibilities for audit committee in respect of related party transactions, disclosure of related party transactions to be part of company board&lsquo;s report
# Audit committee to

Standing committee recommendations

V K Shunglu, who retired as the Comptroller and Auditor General eight years ago, is the kind of retired bureaucrat every government would like to retain. He has proved to be unfailingly reliable, a great virtue for a government with unparalleled faith in the power of committees. If there is a committee and Shunglu is heading it, his peers say you can be sure that the government will hear what it wants to hear.

Newsmaker: V K Shunglu

Irony stalks Meena Gupta like a shadow. The spotlight fell on the former secretary in the ministry of environment &amp; forests recently for her dissenting note as head of a four-member committee of experts constituted by the ministry on July 28. The panel&rsquo;s brief: to review compliance with environmental and coastal regulation zone clearances by the Posco steel project in Orissa.

BS People: Meena Gupta

Although below expectations, experts see proposals as largely positive.

DTC's impact on India Inc

It&rsquo;s been a little over two years now that the back-to-back opening of steel-and-glass Bangalore International Airport and Hyderabad International Airport revolutionised the gateways to a modern India. Today, both are poised for major expansion.

Bangalore, Hyderabad airport cities are ready to take wing

With five states going to polls, 2011 promises to provide enormous political entertainment.

Here come the polls

Twenty years ago, Manmohan Singh as finance minister had presented what is commonly regarded as India&rsquo;s first reforms Budget. Two decades later, how different have the finance ministry&rsquo;s concerns and preoccupations been? There are two ways of assessing it. One way is to compare the key Budget numbers then with those that will confront Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee as he prepares to present the Budget for 2011-12 next month.

A K Bhattacharya: 20 years: Any difference?

Indian economy has shown significant growth acceleration during 2010-11. The growth of real GDP during the first two quarters of the current fiscal averaged 8.9 per cent as compared to the 7.5 per cent recorded during the corresponding period last year. Furthermore, the acceleration has been broad-based as seen in agriculture, industry as well as services.

M Govinda Rao: Policy Challenges for the year 2011

The film Social Network may be a fictional or realistic account of the creation of Facebook.

Madhukar Sabnavis: Intellectual property

Steeped in forbidding history, soaked in blood, but with arms wide open in the traditional Afghan welcome, Kabul is surely the world&rsquo;s most surreal capital city.

Kabul diaries

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