RISING INCOMES: Due to a number of factors such as microfinance products, exemption from income tax, NREGA, mass media penetration, investment in rural infrastructure and the increased production of higher-value crops, disposable incomes in rural households are increasing, thus creating a positive scope for retail opportunity in rural India.

KIT: Growing Drivers for Rural Indian Opportunity

Business Standard

Kraft&rsquo;s $19.7-billion acquisition of Cadbury Plc pits the world&rsquo;s second-largest food company against its arch rival Nestle, the world&rsquo;s largest player in the organised food space, in a market like India, which is an important one for most food companies today.

Kraft set to get a taste of India

It&rsquo;s action time in the sports car segment with Japanese car giant Nissan Motor on Wednesday launching its flagship sports car &mdash; the 370Z &mdash; in India.

The Nissan 370Z is here

Srinivas Krishnan has a revelatory experience in the latest and most aggressive Z yet.

Z-sus!

Kiran and Shiv Nadar will throw open their collection of art this evening at the HCL Technologies campus in Noida.

First day, first show

Rrishi Raote tells you how to go about it.

Buying a piano?

An amazing thing happened. I gave up my editorial rights and gave the Mercedes-Benz C 230 long-termer to Srini, the associate editor of Business Standard Motoring to drive. In its place came the Skoda Laura &mdash; the VW Jetta&rsquo;s illicit sister that makes mincemeat of Indian driving/road conditions. I was just about starting to enjoy the Mercedes experience when I lost the big badge on the grille to vandals. Trust me, a C-Class in avant garde trim is ugly without the big three-pointed, chromed badge and I could not bear the sight of mine without one. Logical enough? The associate editor is not complaining.

Hi-Figo!

For most guitar enthusiasts &mdash; budding or professional &mdash; their instrument is much more than, well, just an instrument &mdash; it&rsquo;s a friend, a companion, or a piece of art that needs care and attention. With the penchant for jazzing up guitars growing among aficionados, the market for guitar accessories is growing too.

How to jazz up your guitar

I am debating between buying a Honda Accord and Skoda Superb. The car will largely be used for city driving in Mumbai.

Executive decision

Most large cities and towns offer multiple options for Western music students. Here are a few.

Music schools

It&rsquo;s the last house on a side street off a village road in North Goa, and the unusual peaked roofs atop laterite walls stir curiosity. Margarida and Werner Beck, who live in Germany, gave their architect, Goa-based Dean D&rsquo;Cruz, a simple brief. It was to be a holiday home in the best sense of the word, in which they would spend three to four months every year. D&rsquo;Cruz, who designed the Nilaya resort in Goa, is known for his ease with natural materials and fluid expressive designs.

A tight plot, a high roof, an open plan

You know those mothers who say, &ldquo;You look lovely in anything you wear. Please don&rsquo;t do a thing differently?&rdquo; My mother wasn&rsquo;t one of those. My mother&rsquo;s greatest regret is that her daughters never really got into the whole pretty frocks thing. I think she, who was a bit of a clotheshorse, would dearly have liked to have fashion-forward offspring; but very early on, I took my clothing into my own decidedly fashion-backward hands.

Wardrobe malfunction

Paris, and its contiguous Ile-de-France metropolitan area, has some of the most distinctive, radical structures built in the last 50 years or so. Think of the Pompidou Centre wrapped in exposed, colour-coded service pipes, which created a stir when it opened in 1977. Or the glass pyramid entrance to the Louvre and the spectacular Grand Arch that reinterprets the classical aesthetics of the Arc De Triomphe in a 20th century vocabulary of glass and steel. Le Corbusier, Frank Gehry, Jean Nouvel, I M Pei, Renzo Piano &mdash; some of the most eminent architects of the last century left their mark on the city, which saw a lot of re-building activity in the post-war years and again, under Fran&ccedil;ois Mitterrand.

Building for keeps

Literary festivals begin as small ideas, a couple of tents, a gathering of friends. And over the years,they acquire layers and textures, and a life less ordinary.

Books in real life

Rajmohan Gandhi, a man of peace, has written a riveting account of two revolts mired in blood and butchery. Geeta Doctor met the author on his recent visit to Chennai.

Two conflicts and a quest

If I Could Tell You is a rather modest title for a book that makes no pretence of doing anything else. You could have your own point of view on whether something so essentially personal, with no real context or history, should stretch to 200 pages between two hard covers, but there&rsquo;s no&nbsp;doubting the sincerity of intent.&nbsp;&ldquo;Me at my most truthful and unadorned,&rdquo; the unnamed narrator says, as he weaves a lyrical tale of his life in a series of letters to his daughter.

Love, interrupted

Paris, Summer 1967&rdquo;, the section is titled, and in it the youthful Reem leaves to study in &ldquo;everybody&rsquo;s dream city&rdquo;, where she believes she will be free in a way that is impossible at home. No sooner does she arrive, however, than the 1967 Six-Day War breaks out between Israel and its Arab neighbours. &ldquo;It took a day in Paris,&rdquo; Reem recounts, &ldquo;for me to realise one never really leaves home.

Curfew humour

Ambika Hinduja, daughter of Ashok Hinduja, the youngest of the four Hinduja brothers, grew up on a diet of Bollywood, Hollywood and some &ldquo;incredible&rdquo; world cinema. She studied filmmaking in London and assisted filmmakers such as Subhash Ghai and Farhan Akhtar. In 2005, she launched Serendipity Films, which produced the critically acclaimed Being Cyrus. Her second film, Teen Patti, will release on February 26 and stars Amitabh Bachchan, Sir Ben Kingsley and R Madhavan. It&rsquo;s an exciting time to be in the Hindi film industry, she tells Abhilasha Ojha.

'It's all about imagination'

On December 20, 2009, the Andhra Pradesh cybercrime police arrested a 23-year-old internet hacker for allegedly swindling Rs 30,600 from an HDFC Bank customer. This is simply a case in point.

Banking on the net makes sense

The Google Nexus One, not officially available in India, has made its way on e-commerce websites like eBay. Priced at Rs 38,000 on eBay, it is a costly buy.

A smart nexus of phones

A price tag is often what comes in between most fashion lovers and their cherished brands. While we all love to sport high-end luxury products, the price for it is, more often than not, way too high.

Business with bytes, not bricks

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