Today's GK

Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen spoke to Rukmini S and Girija Shivakumar about his new book with Jean Dreze, ‘An Uncertain Glory,’ rights and the rise of the right. In the last few years there’s been a considerable resurgence of right-influenced politics and economics in India. Do you think this is this in part a response to Left’s perceived failure at solving major development concerns?

Central to that concern are two bits of foggy identification. One is the idea that being pro-market and making good use of market requires you to be pro-business. So that if you are not being pro- business then you cannot conceivably be asking for getting market efficiency. So anyone who maybe critical of the reach of business is seen as being against pro-markets. While that happens on the right, on the left there is a tendency to assume that since you are anti-business you have a reason to be anti-market, whereas you do need markets for many kinds of efficiency. That confusion is quite strong and it applies on both sides.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will meet U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington and attend the U.N. General Assembly in New York during a week-long visit towards the end of September. The indications came from a 75-minute meeting between Dr. Singh and visiting U.S. Vice-President Joe Biden, here on Tuesday. While Mr. Biden went through the checklist of economic issues that the U.S. wants India to resolve, Dr. Singh highlighted the prospects of a tighter visa regime for Indian software professionals and the need for technological and trading partnerships in the area of shale gas. The two leaders also spent time on regional issues, especially the U.S. initiatives being taken to stabilise Afghanistan before the withdrawal by the bulk of western forces from the country. The situation in Syria and Iran’s nuclear file also came up for discussion, said government sources.

With U.S. politicians having come under pressure from American companies which have even formalised their reservations against India’s trade practices under the “Alliance for Fair Trade with India,” economics dominated discussions on bilateral issues.

Mr. Biden also had a meeting with Vice-President Hamid Ansari and Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj, who called on him. Hosting a banquet in the evening, Mr. Ansari, a former career diplomat, in his own way counselled patience. “Wishing to be friends, it is said, is quick work but friendship is a slow ripening fruit that requires diligent tending,” he said while pointing out that India would like to “cherish, as you do, the right to disagree without losing sight of our endeavour for the common good.”

The U.S. intention is to have several economic agreements in place by the time Dr. Singh meets Mr. Obama. In fact Mr. Biden’s visit was announced by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry when he came here for the Strategic Dialogue last month and realised that several initiatives of economic nature have been pending at the official level for a long time and needed high level political push to get them sorted out.

Nuclear plant in Gujarat

While the U.S. managed to get its way on higher foreign direct investment limits in several sectors as well as catalysed an unprecedented withdrawal of a policy (on Preferential Market Access) , the biggest financial attraction for Washington — Westinghouse’s plans to build civil nuclear reactors in Gujarat — still remains to be sorted out despite the September-end deadline agreed upon by both sides. In particular both sides have some distance to cover on the maximum ceiling that an equipment supplier will bear in case of an accident in the nuclear power plant.

The U.S. expressed its willingness to partner India in shale gas technology, which is a much different proposition as compared to other hydrocarbons — right from the geological survey stage to final exploration. The U.S. also gave assurances on India being a candidate for shale gas exports although both countries have not signed a Free Trade Agreement (FTA). Under the U.S. laws a non-FTA country has to be specially allowed by its Department of Energy to import shale gas whose production in the U.S. has risen 100 times in the last 10 years and likely to reach 5 million barrels per day by 2020. With the military’s Pacific Command chief accompanying him, discussions also touched joint Indo-U.S. military exercises — 60 at the last count in about nine years — and a combined shot at developing military hardware, essentially aimed at ensuring technology transfer, through the Defence Technology Initiative.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Industry has recommended the creation of a ‘Retail Regulatory Authority’ to not only monitor the entry of foreign chains through foreign direct investment (FDI) but to also study the impact of FDI on medium, small and micro enterprises (MSME). Addressing reporters here, Chairman of the committee Triuchi Siva said the committee had recommended a regulatory authority to look into the impact of FDI in multi-brand retail on MSMEs.

The committee, he said, was of the view that if multi-brand retail chains were not regulated well, it would adversely impact MSMEs, farmers and domestic markets. “Once the agriculture produce markets are eliminated, the big foreign retail giants will manipulate prices and our farmers will be forced to sell their products at low prices dictated by foreign retailers. Our own squeezed out retailers would lose their livelihood ,” he said. The committee was also of the view that the 30 per cent procurement requirement should be applicable item-wise, he said.

The panel suggested the MSME ministry should commission a survey to assess the benefit and losses of previous FDI policies on the MSME sector, and to ascertain if they had created any back-end infrastructure as was being envisaged in the current FDI policy.

 
Arvind Sharma, the Chairman and CEO of Leo Burnett, India subcontinent was re-elected as the President of Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI)M. G. Parameswaran, CEO, Mumbai, Draftfcb+Ulka Advertising, in the meanwhile, was re-elected as the Vice-President of the association. 

AAAI is the official as well as national organisation of all the advertising agencies of India. 

It provides training to the advertising professionals as well as recognises its creative work through the coveted Triple-A Awards. It also honours the advertising men through AAAI-Premnarayen Award

Aditya Birla Group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla has resigned from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) board to avoid any conflict of interest as one of his group firm is in the race for a new banking licence, a company spokesperson said Tuesday Birla was a member of the RBI's central board, the apex policy making body of the country's central bank. Birla's name does not figure in the updated list of directors of the RBI board as posted on the central bank's website. The prominent private sector representatives on the board include Azim Premji, Y. C. Deveshwar and G. M. Rao. None of their group firms are seeking a banking licence.

The 22nd Annual Conference of the Neurotrauma Society of India is to be held in Guwahati, Assam from 23 to 25 August 2013. About twelve International neuroscientists and twenty national faculties would be participating in this event. This is the first conference being organized in the North Eastern states of the country. The conference will help to create awareness about the Neurotrauma.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan on 23 July 2013 ordered the Election Commission of Pakistan to hold the Presidential election on 30 July 2013. The decision of the Supreme Court of Pakistan was issued following the petition filed by, Raja Zafarul Haq, the PML(N) leader, who pleaded the court that a large number of Parliamentarians, who will cast vote in the election would precede for Umrah and observe Aitakaf, during the last ten days of Ramazan.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has planned to revisit the SatCom Policy 2000 to improve the guidelines related to allocation and pricing of satellite transponders for public and non-government users. A revisit to the allocation norms has been increasingly felt in recent years as ISRO’s user groups have far outgrown, both in public and private sector.