Importing and marketing wine in India is quite a challenge (if one does it legally) &mdash; the intrepid importer has not only to comply with multifarious requirements and demands of central customs and state excise departments, he also has to convince the somewhat jaded hotel managements and retailers to stock and sell their wares.

One hurdle after another

Business Standard

Amidst the anguish about corruption &ndash; and, one might add, the dirty tricks unleashed against those campaigning on the issue &ndash; people have tended to forget that the big story in India, the truly exciting story, remains rapid economic growth. That was underlined by the Planning Commission formally adopting on Thursday a 9-9.5 per cent annual growth target for the five years beginning next April &mdash; building on the average of 7.8 per cent in the preceding 10 years. The size of the middle class has exploded, and the poverty numbers have declined (you can argue by how much, but there is no credible statistical pattern of growth that says incomes double in a decade, and literacy climbs from 65 per cent to 74 per cent, but the absolute poor remain where they were.

T N Ninan: The big story

The recent experience regarding the Lok Pal Bill has re-confirmed a nagging feeling I have been harbouring for a long time. It has to do with what we do as a nation, and the way we do it. There is no dearth of brilliant people in India; in every activity that one can think of, we have people who can hold their own against the best in the world &mdash; be it movies, cricket, science or medicine. And the people who excel do so in a highly competitive, global and professional world. However, when it comes to solving our own societal problems, we show a serious lack of professionalism. This is not to say that the problems we face are simple and any professional expert can solve them; but certainly, the chances of a professional expert coming up with a solution are no worse than those of a well-meaning non-professional.

Shubhashis Gangopadhyay: Corruption - let's be professional about it

If a week is a long time in politics, a month is four times as long and 34 years, a geological aeon. Polling in West Bengal&rsquo;s Vidhan Sabha elections started this week. In a month&rsquo;s time, the results could end a 34-year aeon.

Devangshu Datta: Mamata's train of time-servers

HAL Market in east Bangalore, just off the Old Airport Road, sits on a prominent corner of the public sector giant&rsquo;s huge stretches of real estate that could have earned Bangalore the sobriquet of HAL City, until software came and began to hog the limelight. The market is fascinatingly poised between the informal and the formal economy and in many ways symbolises India in the making, both promise and loose ends showing.

Subir Roy: HAL Market - A taste of India 

The only readers of this column I am wary of are overseas citizens of India, people of Indian origin, non-resident Indians (NRIs), call them what you will, in the US. Not distinguished achievers like Jhumpa Lahiri and Siddhartha Mukherjee, but ordinary migrants whose patriotic fervour, devotion to Mahatma Gandhi, Hindu zeal, intense anti-westernism and, quite often, venomous hatred of the Congress party leave me gasping.

Sunanda K Datta-Ray: The emigrant song

The government&rsquo;s think-tank seems suddenly optimistic about cash-transfers and coupons (direct transfers) to reach subsidies to the target population. Direct transfers are being talked of as the panacea in major areas involving subsidies &mdash; food, education, fertiliser, kerosene, and so on. There are, however, several weaknesses in the panacea.

V Kumaraswamy: Direct transfers, hidden costs

Under the United Nations Environment Programme&rsquo;s Stockholm convention, 12 pesticides have been banned for being Persistent Organic Pollutants. Now, Endosulfan is being considered for inclusion in that list.

Sreelatha Menon: Alternatives to poison

Energy industries will outperform in the longer term.

Betting on renewables

While it is still early days to get an accurate picture of the monsoon rains India is likely to get this year, the initial consensus view based on the monsoon model developed by Indian scientists and statisticians suggests that a normal monsoon is to be expected. It would take a very foolhardy and risk-prone analyst to try and offer any other kind of prediction at this stage.

Chasing the monsoon

Our aim is to strengthen the legislative framework, revamp administrative practices and procedures, and fast track a systemic response to fighting corruption. A group of ministers is looking into the legal and administrative measures that can be taken in this regard. The group has a wide-ranging mandate and I expect its recommendations to be available very soon.

'People value honest work done by a civil servant'

After twenty years of reform, areas that still need attention are nfrastructure, labour reforms, land acquisition, environment clearances, an integrated domestic market and a second green revolution.

Hari Shankar Singhania: A milestone reached, an agenda unfinished

Who will guard the guardians? The need for this rhetorical question arises because the custodians of our nation&rsquo;s integrity are themselves found wanting. The answer, to a substantial extent, is, of course, the Lokpal. Clearing the Augean stables is literally a Herculean task and requires an out-of-the-box solution. Anna Hazare&rsquo;s cameo effort has focused the nation&rsquo;s attention on the menace.

Raghu Dayal: Who will guard the guardians?

There is a perceptible wane in the claims being raised before Courts by random stakeholders, whether spearheaded by trade unions or otherwise, claiming the status of employees, as also in the Courts allowing such claims.

Streamlining the employment regime

The dynamic nature of Indian tax laws witnessed in recent years would easily mark an inflection point for multinationals doing business in India, given th resolve and pledge to overhaul tax regime by ushering the twin new legislations of Direct taxes Code (DTC) expected to be made effective from April 2012 and Goods &amp; Services Tax (GST). Whilst, the DTC would replace the five decade old law, GST is anticipated to bring a fundamental shift in taxation of trade of goods and services. With several veratax policy changes slated to occur in less than 12 months headquarters of , multinationals are scrambling with a robust strategy for transition to the new tax regimes. The last mile in the transition process could well be more stressful for MNCs with India&rsquo;s promise to G20 towards International Financial reporting Standards (IFRS) convergence.

Changing tax laws and blurring lines

How regulatory systems should deal with corporate governance came to the fore at the annual conference of the International Organisation of Securities Commissions last week in Cape Town.&nbsp; Opinion across securities regulators seemed to be evenly mixed.

Step back from regulating corporate governance

Some very fundamental issues about direct and indirect taxes have arisen out of the decision regarding reimposing tax on SEZs in the Budget 2011. In the Budget the Finance Minister has declared that as a measure to ensure equal sharing of corporate tax liability, he proposes to levy Minimum Alternate Tax (MAT) on developers of special economic zones as well as units operating in SEZs. This measure has been resisted by the SEZ developers on different grounds. One of the grounds is that an exemption granted by the SEZ Act cannot be changed by the Finance Act. The second ground is that the developers have already made substantial amount of investment (one estmate puts it at Rs.1.95 lakh crores) and now this will not be viable any more.

Is the withdrawal of exemption for SEZ  legally tenable?

The Spring Fund Bank meetings were held in Washington recently. The big news was that emerging markets rejected IMF&rsquo;s plan to guide capital controls.

A V Rajwade: End of dollar dominance?

It&rsquo;s obvious! Get the engine fixed. The UPA government&rsquo;s fiscal reforms agenda, however, is like option B. No institutional reforms to reduce waste and inefficiency are being implemented. Drastic tax-reform, mainly to improve revenues, is a priority. Even these revenue reforms are poorly designed and high-risk as discussed below.

Arindam Das-Gupta: Fiscal reform: Why not tackle the waste? 

That the Union Minister of State for Environment and Forests has not exactly endeared himself to many of his ministerial colleagues is by now an open secret.

Sanjaya Baru: Jairam Ramesh has a point

Amid the excitement over India&rsquo;s World Cup victory in cricket, Anna Hazare&rsquo;s movement against corruption and Assembly elections in five states, we have almost forgotten that Parliament passed the Union Budget for 2011-12 even before the new financial year had begun and its Budget session ran for just about a month.

A K Bhattacharya: Budgeting for elections

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