The government proposes to bring before Parliament a civil service Bill which, if it fulfils its aims, can have far-reaching consequences. It seeks to address some of the key shortcomings that have bedevilled the country&rsquo;s administration by introducing an evaluation system for civil servants that has a bearing on the way the department or programme has performed. The proposed system seeks to protect the civil servant from political interference, and visualises a central public service authority which will administer the system and deliver appropriate working conditions for civil servants while holding them accountable. What is new is that the members of this authority will not be selected by the government of the day but by a committee comprising the Prime Minister, the leader of the opposition and a Supreme Court judge.

Guaranteeing public service

Business Standard

More and more people around the world are inclined to believe that the worst of the economic crisis is over, and that the signs of recovery are in the air. In India, the sense of optimism has been reinforced by the rather unexpected political outcome, which potentially frees the government of the many constraints it operated within during its previous term. Anticipation is building up about a breakthrough Budget, which will add momentum to the virtuous circle of evidence and expectations. However, before the book is closed on the meltdown, it would be prudent to do a reality check on the state of the economy, toting up the negative signals along with the positive.

Reality check

When the then finance minister, P Chidambaram, observed in his 2007-08 Budget speech that weather-based insurance could be a promising risk mitigation scheme for farmers, he would not have known how events could turn out. The test has come with the Aila cyclone, which has caused large-scale devastation in West Bengal, one of the five states where weather-based insurance cover is available to farmers. Going by media reports, while the crop damage is reckoned at over Rs 500 crore, insurers may have to pay only around Rs 7 lakh by way of compensation. The catch lies in the technicalities &mdash; that the bulk of the crop damage was due to winds and tides and not rains, which at most places measured a tad lower than the threshold level after which the claim becomes due.

Taking care of farmers

When the stock markets suddenly took off three months ago, it looked initially like a bear-market rally that would soon fizzle out. As the rally became a sustained, broad-spectrum uptick, various other reasons were trotted out&mdash;including, in India, the unexpected outcome of the elections and the routing of the Marxists. Now it is clear that the upturn has been there in all the emerging markets, and that it signals a fundamental change of mood. Investors seem to have concluded that the worst of the worst recession in 80 years is over, and that the only question to be answered is whether the recovery will be fast or slow.

Soaring optimism

It is almost certain that the government will announce during the Budget session of Parliament a schedule for providing national food security to everyone below the poverty line. This was one of the Congress party&rsquo;s biggest promises during the Lok Sabha elections, and a law is to be passed that makes 25 kg of rice every month at Rs 3/kg a justifiable entitlement for all poor families. Since there are some 50 million such families, the subsidy in such a programme has been calculated at Rs 50,000 crore&mdash;rather more than the Rs 31,000 crore that was spent last year on the rural employment guarantee programme. Before the government plunges into implementing its promise, it needs to consider alternative options.

Cash, not grain

The finance minister has an unenviable task. After years of buoyant revenues, Mr Mukherjee faces the once familiar challenge of squaring the fiscal circle. He let the fiscal deficit slip last year, and no one complained in the crisis environment of October-March. Now, informed observers will look for some kind of re-balancing as reassurance that the fisc will be pushed back on to even keel, in stages. At the same time, expectations from the new government are high.

Budgeting in difficult times

The plea by an edible oil industry body for fixing an indicative price band within which the domestic prices of cooking oils are allowed to float without any import tariff modifications, makes immense sense. Such a band would be delineated while keeping in mind the interests of both oilseed growers (remunerative prices for their produce) and consumers (cooking oil at reasonable prices).

A price band for oilseeds

In May, a &ldquo;moderate&rdquo; Kashmiri separatist stood for election to the Lok Sabha. This was a &ldquo;first&rdquo;, and there was more than the usual interest because the separatists have always been taunted that they do not subject themselves to the test of popular choice because they know that they do not represent the majority view in even Kashmir valley. Well, Sajjad Lone had decided that he would take the test, and he failed badly.

The human rights question

Consumer durables lead a lopsided turnaround.

A 'durable' recovery?

Neither the BJP nor the Left has done real introspection.

Farce follows defeat

With the state-owned National Aviation Company of India Limited (Nacil) forced to delay salary payments, it could be that the government will now rush through the package that the company has been demanding for many months. Whatever the final details of the bailout package (Nacil officials insist it is not a bailout but the cost of the merger of Air-India and Indian Airlines, which the government must legitimately pay for), the government&rsquo;s strategy remains unclear.

Headed for crash-landing

The latest round of talks for thrashing out a successor to the Kyoto accord on climate change, on the basis of the new text circulated by the secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), ended in Bonn on Friday and saw an unexpected, if subtle, shift in the US stand which could change the course of these negotiations.

Flashing amber, not green

Though Anil Ambani&rsquo;s Reliance Natural Resources Limited (RNRL) has won its battle with older brother Mukesh Ambani&rsquo;s Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), it may be a while before this translates into action on the ground.

The smell of gas

An article by Timothy Geithner, US treasury secretary, and Lawrence Summers, director of the National Economic Council, published in the Washington Post on Monday, provides an outline of the Obama administration&rsquo;s financial reform agenda. It comprises five broad themes, each drawing on specific inferences about the causes of (and lessons from) the recent financial crisis.

Light rules, firmly applied

The finance minister favours consolidation among public sector banks; this has revived the prospects of State Bank of India merging its six associate banks with itself. While the hostile reaction of the unions is predictable, there could be broader opposition as well. The merger idea was first mooted with an eye on the largest Chinese banks and a desire to have at least one Indian bank in the same league.

No magic bullet

The unabated rise in the number of swine flu cases, involving chiefly people who have returned to India after picking up the infection abroad, points to laxity in screening incoming passengers at the country&rsquo;s international airports. This should be a cause of concern, and something that the government needs to address without delay.

Stop it at the airports

For some time now, retail investors in Initial Public Offerings(IPOs) have resented the fact that they had to pay up the full amount for the shares they were applying for, whereas larger institutional investors were getting away by paying a small fraction of the bid amount. In fact, Qualified Institutional Buyers (QIBs) paid nothing for a long time, until the regulator stepped in to say they needed to cough up at least 10 per cent of the value of the shares applied for.

Levelling the field

The regulation of clinical trials (testing of new drugs on human beings before they are approved) has taken a step forward with the registration of such trials being made mandatory. Such registration in a public registry, freely accessible to all, before the first volunteer is recruited, has several benefits flowing from greater transparency. At any moment it is necessary to know what kind of clinical research is taking place in the country to see if this matches the prevalent disease pattern.

Transparency in drug trials

Have money, will spend. If that was the mantra of India Inc in better times, it&rsquo;s a no-brainer that the opposite will be equally true when money is difficult to find. With the global recession wreaking havoc in every corner of the marketing business, expensive and glitzy award shows can&rsquo;t be an exception.

India's day out at Cannes

High base, not deficient demand, is responsible.

Certainly not deflation

There is as yet no serious damage to kharif prospects.

An uncertain monsoon

Incisive columns and editorial comment by top opinion leaders

Page 571 - Editorial Comment