Archives: All articles - English

The 2014 general elections saw the parliamentary Left becoming wea­ker than ever before. Three years earlier, the red bastion had crumbled in West Bengal after 34 years. The question is whether the clutch of par­­ties headed by the CPI(M) is lik­ely to lose even more political ground. Or was the writer (who passed away before his book was published) being realistic when, as the title suggests, he compared the Left to a mythical Greek bird that is cyclically regenerated or reborn? It seems almost...

Did particular functionaries of the Narendra Modi government and supporters of the Bharatiya Janata Party anticipate that their actions would contribute to a young PhD student of the Jawaharlal Nehru University becoming a folk-hero of sorts in a matter of days? If they did not, they have only themselves to blame. True, many could argue that the media attention Kanhaiya Kumar is getting is going to be ephemeral and that such transient instances of individual fame do not have a lasting impact on...

Auctions, whether at Christie’s or Sotheby’s for works of art, or of telecommunications spectrum by the government of India, are fascinating psychological games. When the interests of large competing corporate groups are involved, not surprisingly, allegations are aired of criminal intent by manipulation of rules. Even as the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) prepares for the next round of auctions of scarce – and hence, valuable – electromagnetic spectrum, the person at the helm of this...

Union budgets in India are not bland statements of accounts. Budgets are much more than the balance sheets of income earned and expenditure incurred by the central government. Budgets are important occasions for the finance minister of the day to outline his government’s political and economic strategies. Budgets are often less about numbers and much more about atmospherics. As a statement on the country’s political economy, Arun Jaitley’s third budget for the coming financial year starting on...

As one listened to finance minister Arun Jaitley deliver his third Budget speech, the overwhelming impression that was sought to be created was along anticipated lines. Here was a government whose heart was bleeding for the hapless farmer toiling in the fields, the agriculturist whose livelihood has been all but destroyed by two successive monsoon failures. Here was an administration whose representatives were concerned about the “curse of smoke” polluting the lungs of poor women cooking for...

The big message emanating from Finance Minister Arun Jaitley's third budget is that the Narendra Modi government's heart is bleeding for the farmer and that the government is more concerned about the plight of poor women and the underprivileged, not corporate captains or rich taxpayers. The effort clearly is to counter the suit-boot sarkar image of the government that has been sought to be assiduously propagated by Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi and other political opponents of the...

Who would have imagined that the presentation of the Union Budget for the 12 months that start from All Fools’ Day is just round the corner? This will be finance minister Arun Jaitley’s third Budget; he will be presenting two more and then an interim Budget in February 2019 before the next general elections. But the economy seems to be the last thing that is occupying the minds of large sections of the population. Just about everything else is. The agitation by Jats has suddenly disrupted the...

Is the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act a “living monument” of the failure of the economic policies of the Indian National Congress which has ruled the country for all but roughly 14 years since August 1947? Or is it that the MGNREGA, a law enacted a decade ago which seeks to implement the world’s biggest and most ambitious job creating scheme, one of the few programmes that has been successful in not just alleviating poverty but has also empowered the underprivileged in...

As Reliance Jio Infocomm prepares to launch its 4G telecom services, a public interest litigation is being heard in the Supreme Court that challenges the government’s decision to allow the company to offer voice services on its 4G spectrum. In June 2010, an e-auction of electromagnetic spectrum had ended with a small Internet Service Provider called Infotel Broadband Services Private Limited trumping bigger rivals to emerge as the winner. Hours after the auction, Reliance Industries Limited took...

Before it turned into a courtroom spat, it had started as another court hearing. On January 12, while hearing a public interest litigation against Reliance Jio Infocomm, the Supreme Court of India challenged the credentials of the petitioner, activist-lawyer Prashant Bhushan’s Centre for Public Interest Litigation. A three-judge bench, including Chief Justice TS Thakur, asked if the NGO was taking the system “for a ride”. It raised the question whether the non-profit nature of the NGO could be...

It is not every day that promoters or directors of large real estate companies have to spend time behind bars for allegedly duping home buyers. So when four directors of Unitech Limited, the country’s second-largest real estate financing firm, found themselves in judicial custody on Monday on being unable to complete bail formalities, it was bound to be news. For big builders, the episode came as a strong jolt, and share prices of realty companies came tumbling down. For flat buyers, who...

The New Year has brought little cheer for the economies of almost each and every country across the globe. The Government of India never fails to remind us that this is one of the few nations on the planet, certainly the only large country, which continues to witness reasonably robust rates of growth of gross domestic product (GDP). No man is an island. And we would be deluding ourselves if we believe that the Indian economy would remain insulated from what is happening all around us...

Maachher teley maachh bhaaja is a Bengali phrase for the culinary practice of frying a fish in its own oil. Can the analogy be extended to a set of convoluted corporate transactions? This is the story of how one of the richest men of Indian origin, who heads one of the world's biggest privately owned mining and metals conglomerates, is seeking to protect his highly-leveraged balance sheets at a time when commodity prices across the globe have collapsed. (A company is said to be highly leveraged...

Why has the Narendra Modi government apparently acted in a vindictive manner by preventing Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal from entering his office during a raid on Tuesday by the Central Bureau of Investigation on one of his senior bureaucrats? At first glance, the move appears politically damaging. Whatever be the merits of the CBI's decision to search the office and premises of the Principal Secretary to the Delhi government Rajendra Kumar, the Modi government may end up making Kejriwal...

It’s a huge story. And it’s not getting the kind of media attention it deserves. It’s a story about India’s farmers. It’s a story about the ongoing agrarian crisis in the country in the wake of two successive years of drought. If one looks only at the figures of growth of gross domestic product which tend to make headlines in financial publications, there’s no story for agriculture comprises 16-17 per cent of GDP. But this is a blinkered view. The picture is pretty grim and here’s why. At least...

After a humiliating defeat in Bihar, the BJP led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has no option but to become more conciliatory towards its political opponents. While adopting a consensual approach rather than a confrontationist one, the party will have to keep its flock together by periodically placating hardcore Hindu nationalists in the Sangh Parivar, the family of organisations led by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. This is the big challenge before the BJP. When out of power, the fact that...

The Narendra Modi government's stated intention to divest a 10% stake in Coal India Limited is aimed at establishing its reformist credentials after the humiliating defeat of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Bihar assembly elections. While the proceeds of the divestment will help contain the fiscal deficit, by moving money from one pocket of the government to another, the move will neither help the country nor the public sector company, which is the world's largest coal producing entity. Here's...

Following the decisive victory of the Mahagathbandhan of the JD(U) led by Nitish Kumar, the RJD headed by Lalu Prasad Yadav, and the Congress in the Assembly elections in Bihar, there has been considerable specu-lation about the likelihood of political forces opposed to the BJP coming together. The convergence of all anti-BJP parties will obviously imply that there is bad news ahead for the regime headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But those supporting the BJP argue that sharp...

The trajectory of Lalu’s career in politics has not been smooth. He became a member of the Lok Sabha as early as 1977, when the Janata Party made a clean sweep of all 54 seats in Bihar riding a wave of popular anger against the Emergency which had ended barely three months before the elections were held. Yet, hardly anybody outside his constituency had heard of Lalu in this period. In fact, he had not even been a member of the Bihar assembly prior to contesting the Lok Sabha elections that year...

Lalu Prasad Yadav is back, and how. His party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal gained the most in the just-concluded assembly elections in Bihar. There's no gainsaying that without the presence of the RJD, the grand alliance or mahagathbandhan led by chief minister Nitish Kumar and his Janata Dal (United) would never have been able to decisively defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance. What is perceived as a personal victory for Lalu after his conviction and imprisonment in...

It is almost certain that the outcome of the Bihar assembly elections will disappoint investors in shares when stock markets open on Monday. Large sections of the Indian corporate sector, which were gung-ho about Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party, are unhappy that Nitish Kumar will again become chief minister of the economically-backward state. Even before the Bihar elections were over, one section of businesspersons in India had turned critical of the government. This...

The collective decisions by authors, academics, activists, filmmakers and scientists to return awards given to them may be dismissed as “politics by other means” and as “ideological intolerance” by those who are “pathologically opposed” to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the BJP and its ideological parent RSS. But these protests are now taking a different turn and hitting the government where it hurts: the economy. What is worse is that leading corporate captains are hauling up the government —...

On October 15, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India answered the prime minister’s call for action. Not long after Narendra Modi criticised the countrywide phenomenon of calls drops, the regulator laid down rules to penalise mobile telephone operators in a knee-jerk reaction. From January 1 next year, according to these new rules, telecom operators will have to pay consumers Re 1 for every call dropped, limited to a cap of three call drops per day. Much of the discussion on the subject has...

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has a particular fondness for what are supposed to be smart cities. He wants many dozens of them across the country. Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu of the Telugu Desam Party is no different. He wants to build Amaravati, a "greenfield" capital city where four million people would eventually reside. He wants the new city to be not just bigger but "better" than Singapore. The two men together with many very, very important persons are scheduled to...

Judges have in the past castigated India's premier police investigating agency, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). But the manner in which Special CBI Judge Om Prakash Saini has flayed the agency has raised more than a few eyebrows. Saini is adjudicating over a slew of criminal cases related to the mis-allocation and mis-pricing of second-generation telecommunications airwaves, popularly called the 2G spectrum scam. On 15 October, the judge, himself a former cop, described CBI's...

An article that appeared in thehoot.org in November 2013 has suddenly been attracting considerable attention. Reason: the article was about how Peter and Indrani Mukerjea sold their stake in the INX/NewsX media group of companies and how India’s biggest private corporate entity, Reliance Industries Limited, headed by the country’s richest man, Mukesh Ambani, acquired control over these firms for a period of time in a convoluted manner. The Hoot stories looked into the examination of these...

The Narendra Modi government’s new scheme to unearth black money kept by Indians outside the country has yielded just about Rs 4,147 crore from 638 declarations. On average, this figure works out to a relatively small amount of Rs 6 crore per declaration — either about holding assets abroad illegally or earning income outside the country which has not been disclosed. Nearly two-thirds of this money, or Rs 2,488 will come to the exchequer by way of taxes. This measly sum is a clear indication...

Under what circumstances can the executive overrule of the judiciary? Obviously, by enacting a law to overturn a court judgment. There are a number of examples of this kind. However, in an unusual - and perhaps unprecedented - move, an Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM), led by former Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram, has been accused of not adhering to the letter and spirit of a judgment of the Supreme Court, in a series of draft reports prepared in the office of the Comptroller &...

The Telecom Disputes Settlements and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) recently ruled that Loop Telecom, a company controlled by the Ruias of Essar group and their associates, will not be repaid a sum of Rs 1,454.94 crore that it had claimed from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) after the firm's licence was cancelled by the Supreme Court of India. The September 16 order by the tribunal vindicates the stand adopted in a series of reports drafted in the office of the Comptroller and Auditor...

An article that appeared in thehoot.org in November 2013 has suddenly been attracting considerable attention. Reason: the article was about how Peter and Indrani Mukerjea sold their stake in the INX/NewsX media group of companies and how India's biggest private corporate entity, Reliance Industries Limited, headed by the country's richest man, Mukesh Ambani, acquired control over these firms for a period of time in a convoluted manner. The Hoot stories looked into the examination of these...

Three months before the end of the calendar year, it is already apparent that 2015 will go down in contemporary history as a watershed year for the planet’s political economy. The sharp slowdown in China, the crisis in Greece, the crash in the prices of oil and other commodities and the influx of immigrants to Europe — all make the year’s developments significant. It was exactly seven years ago this month, when the Great Recession began with New York’s Wall Street collapsing, seven decades after...

Three months before the end of the calendar year, it is already apparent that 2015 will go down in contemporary history as a watershed year for the planet’s political economy. The sharp slowdown in China, the crisis in Greece, the crash in the prices of oil and other commodities and the influx of immigrants to Europe — all make the year’s developments significant. It was exactly seven years ago this month, when the Great Recession began with New York’s Wall Street collapsing, seven decades after...

Vivek Kaul is no ordinary journalist interested in the working of the planet’s political economy. Like many “generalist” journalists, he writes on personal finance, marketing and branding. And if that were not enough, he has an abiding interest in cinema and music. But wait! He has written not one, but three books in a row, on the subject of money, credit and finance that seek to make this complicated and difficult topic more accessible to readers who may not be familiar with economics, commerce...

The amounts being sought as damages by corporate entities in India against publications which have allegedly defamed them are reaching stratospheric levels, even if the chances of recovering such sums of money appear rather remote. In what could be the biggest defamation notice of its kind, BSES Limited, a company in the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG), has sought a stupendous Rs 5,000 crore as damages from Bennett, Coleman and Company Limited (BCCL), publishers of the Times of India, the...

Are prices going up or are they coming down? Is inflation or deflation the bigger problem in India at present? The answers are likely to be diametrically different depending on the person who is being asked these questions. Ask a homemaker shopping for her groceries and she will tell you that the prices of many vegetables and other food items are continuing to rise despite the fall in prices of diesel and petrol. The chief economic adviser to the Government of India in the ministry of finance...

Are prices going up or are they coming down? Is inflation or deflation the bigger problem in India at present? The answers are likely to be diametrically different depending on the person who is being asked these questions. Ask a homemaker shopping for her groceries and she will tell you that the prices of many vegetables and other food items are continuing to rise despite the fall in prices of diesel and petrol. The chief economic adviser to the Government of India in the ministry of finance...

Zee Media Corporation got merged with Essel Publishers Pvt Ltd, as cleared by the Bombay High Court on May 2, 2014 with the appointed date of April 1, 2014. Both are Essel Group companies controlled by Subhash Chandra. The scheme was made effective on May 27, 2014 and given effect to in the financial statements for the quarter ended June 30, 2014. Zee Media issued and allotted 12.23 crore equity shares of Re 1 each to the shareholders of Essel Publishers. Thus, the shareholding of promoter group...

“Speak up, it's in your DNA”, was the catchphrase used on July 30, 2005 when the English daily broadsheet Daily News & Analysis(known by its acronym DNA) was launched by Diligent Media Corporation Limited, a 50:50 joint venture between the Essel/Zee group and DB Corp Ltd, the flagship company of the Dainik Bhaskar group, two of India's biggest media conglomerates. The marriage was supposed to be an ideal one. The Essel/Zee group had financial muscle and diverse national and global business...

On 12 August 2015 the Supreme Court restrained the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) from arresting former Union Minister for Communications Dayanidhi Maran till 14 September. He had earlier been summoned by the CBI for questioning after being accused of installing a “telephone exchange” with 323 lines at his residence at a cost of Rs 400 crore for the benefit of the Sun Television group led by his elder brother Kalanithi Maran. The three-judge bench of the apex court suspected “political...

One of the most distinctive features of the functioning of the Modi government has been its attempt to control the flow of information and marginalise dissent. The PM’s preference for one-way communication is well known. However, attempts by supporters of the BJP and its ideological parent, the RSS, to curb free expression by intimidating those who do not think like them are backfiring. A simple truth about the noisy democracy that is India seems to be escaping many of those in power. The more...

One of the most distinctive features of the functioning of the Narendra Modi government over the last 15 months has been its attempt to control the flows of information and marginalise dissent. The Prime Minister’s preference for one-way communication is well known. However, attempts by supporters of the Bharatiya Janata Party and its ideological parent, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, to curb free expression by intimidating those who do not think like them are backfiring and, in fact...

It is surprising how rapidly some of the most ardent supporters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi have become disillusioned with his government’s performance. It has been barely 15 months since the Bharatiya Janata Party government came to power with 31.5 per cent of the popular vote in May 2014. Yet corporate captains, right-wing ideologues, columnists and pubic intellectuals — many of whom were his ardent cheerleaders and welcomed his ascendancy — are today vying with one another to criticise...

Jo mera hai woh tera hai/ Jo tera hai woh mera (What is mine is yours; what is yours is mine.) o run the first two lines of the Airtel “friendship” song for young people written by Amitabh Bhattacharya and set to a catchy tune by Ram Sampath. Catchy indeed, because the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) in the Government of India’s Ministry of Communications & Information Technology shares such a cosy, symbiotic relationship with the country’s largest telecom group, Bharti Airtel, that these...

Sleight of hand, circumvention of administrative norms, understating revenue to be shared with the government, securing efficient electro-magnetic spectrum for telecommunications at discounted prices or even free, sale of assets and restructuring of company holdings for unconscionable profits. This, according to a draft report of the Comptroller & Auditor General of India – the constitutional body mandated to oversee public finances – summarises the not-so-well-known story behind the incredible...

After the great recession that started in 2008, and eight decades after the first Great Depression wreaked havoc across the world in the 1930s, is Great Depression II in the offing? A day after the media interpreted statements made by the Reserve Bank of India governor, Raghuram G. Rajan, as suggesting that another ’30s-like Great Depression could take place, the RBI clarified that he had not implied that there is an “imminent danger” of the world economy slipping into the Great Depression that...

That the Monsoon Session of Parliament would literally and metaphorically be washed out is hardly a surprise. The political opponents of the Bharatiya Janata Party were determined to use the same tactics deployed by it when the party was out of power for a decade. In the coming three months, attention will be focused less on Delhi’s durbar politics and more on the battle for Bihar. The outcome of the Assembly elections in the state will undoubtedly have a significant bearing on the near-term...

His surname means a girl-child in a number of Indian languages. When asked about his family name, he clarifies that it is a version of Ghori or those who came from the Ghurid kingdom that spanned parts of Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent in the 13th century. Varun Gauri, co-director of the World Development Report 2015 of the World Bank, obtained his doctorate in public policy from Princeton University in 1996 after which he joined the World Bank group. He has worked and conducted...

The Madhya Pradesh Vyavsayik Pariksha Mandal (Vyapam) or Professional Examination Board scam threatens to destabilise not only the government of Shivraj Singh Chouhan (who has been chief minister of the state since November 2005), but the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party as well. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s silence on the issue and attempts by BJP functionaries to brazen it out may backfire on the state government in Bhopal as well as the Central government in Delhi. A superficial reading of the...

Laxminarayan yadav is a wealthy farmer. He lives in Ghumanhera village located on the Delhi-Haryana border. He grows wheat and mustard on five-and-a-half acres of irrigated land. Unseasonal rain destroyed 40 per cent of his winter (rabi) crop in March. The grain that remained edible got coloured; its price is down. He is not exactly happy, but far from despondent. Reason: the Delhi government will be paying him Rs 13,999 as compensation. “I will break even this rabi season,” says he. “I won’t...

There was no Night of the Long Knives. This time, it was boringly predictable. All but the most naive thought that an amicable solution would be found to prevent Greece from leaving the Eurozone. As "erratic Marxist" Yanis Varoufakis put in his papers as the finance minister of Greece, stock markets and currency exchanges didn't know how to react: with trepidation or relief, anger or gladness that the worst was over. Only one thing was certain: uncertainty would continue in the near future, with...