Stop overdoing your strengths
The conventional wisdom in leadership development circles is that you should discover and capitalize on your strengths, assuming that they are aligned with some organizational need. No matter how hard you work on certain weaknesses, the logic goes, chances are you'll make only marginal progress. Don't waste too much time overcoming flaws; better to focus on what you do best and surround your- self with people who have com- plementary strengths.
It's a reasonable approach that emerged as a response to an arguably unhealthy fixation on weaknesses when it came to performance reviews. Eight years ago, in fact, one of us (Kaplan) cited in a short HBR article the value of understand- ing your strengths--and not just because it's hard to over- come weaknesses. But it turns out you can take strengths too far. The article referenced a brilliant media executive who considered himself unexcep- tional. Although he grasped complex concepts more quick- ly than most people, he didn't realize it--so he was impatient with colleagues who, in his view, couldn't keep up. Only with some pointed feedback did he see that he was running roughshod over his colleagues.
In other words, he had un- knowingly corrupted his quick- wittedness by taking it to ex- cess.
This is a common problem.
Most managers can point to an off-kilter leader--the support- ive boss who cuts people a little too much slack, for instance, or the gifted operational director whose relentless focus on re- sults leads to hypercontrol. But it's extremely difficult to see such overkill in yourself.
And that's where leadership development tools are failing us. Dividing qualities into "strengths" and "weaknesses" implicitly ignores strengths overdone. Given this incom- plete mental model, it is no sur- prise that most leadership 360s employ five-point rating scales in which high scores are the best. Such tools overlook a key lesson from decades of re- search on derailment: More is not always better, and execu- tives lose their jobs when their strengths become weaknesses through overuse.
Based on our 25 years of leadership consulting and our analysis of 360-degree feedback on about 1,200 middle and se- nior managers (completed by nearly 15,000 coworkers over the course of a decade), we've devised strategies and tools to help managers recognize when they're taking a strength too far and then correct this counter- productive tendency.
The costs of strengths overused In our research we tested the effects of overused strengths on two aspects of team perfor- mance: vitality (defined as mo- rale, engagement, and cohe- sion) and productivity (quanti- ty and quality of output). We found that taking a strength to an extreme is always detrimen- tal to performance, but even a mild tendency to overdo it can be harmful. Be a little too force- ful, for instance, and your team's output may improve some--but vitality will take a hit, and weakened morale will eventually undercut productiv- ity. Be a little too enabling, and you may shore up vitality--but productivity will suffer over time, which will in turn erode morale. In general, overdoing it hurts your effectiveness just as much as underdoing it (the ex- hibit "The Upshot of Overkill" displays this result for forceful leadership).
One executive we'll call Tom had, when we met him, recent- ly joined his company's man- agement committee. (In the in- terests of protecting our clients' privacy, Tom and the other managers we describe in this piece are composites.) Tom's peers and CEO had but one concern: He came on too strong in committee meetings. This dynamic played out, for exam- ple, in his very public misgiv- ings over a proposed shift to greater centralization. His com- pany, a telecommunications equipment maker, was moving to a shared-services model to cut costs, which were well above the industry average.
Tom argued heatedly that the company should reduce the risk by centralizing in stages.
His stated reason was that the business he ran was performing well; the company should first centralize the functions of busi- nesses that needed to better their margins. Tom's unstated, mostly subconscious, reason was that he took the proposed changes as a lack of apprecia- tion for his track record. By tak- ing his forcefulness to an ex- treme (witness his staunch defense of his position), he de- graded it. This is one cost of overdoing a strength.
There is another cost: lop- sided leadership. Once you overplay a strength, you're at risk of diminished capacity on the opposite pole. For example, a leader who is good at getting people involved in decisions, and has been encouraged to build on that strength, may not realize that in engaging so many others he is taking too long to move into action.
Among the senior managers we studied, 97% who overdo force- ful leadership in some respect also underdo enabling leader- ship, according to coworkers.
And 94% who overdo opera- tional leadership in some way also underdo strategic leader- ship. Marked lopsidedness can limit your personal cachet and career prospects. (See the ex- hibit "Opposing Leadership Virtues" for more detail on two fundamental dualities in lead- ership--forceful versus en- abling, and strategic versus op- erational.) Unfortunately, few leaders recognize when they are underdoing a strength's po- lar opposite.
Finding your balance It's not hard to see why over- doing a strength can get you into trouble, but an intellectual grasp of that concept and even a willingness to change won't save you from yourself. To find some balance, you also have to come to terms with the roots of your behavior. Tom, for in- stance, had always viewed his conduct in a positive light: He was making himself heard, be- ing direct. What's not to like? To be fair, such qualities are strengths--to a point. Tom was shocked to discover that people found him overly aggressive.
A change in mind-set was surprisingly easy for Tom.
That's partly because when he got the bad news, he also learned that his peers, subordi- nates, and CEO held him in high esteem. Respect was a hot button for him; once he no lon- ger felt he had to sell himself, he could relax and listen to other points of view. In a leadership survey conducted before his feedback session, his peers rat- ed him as greatly overdefending his positions. A few months lat- er, another survey showed a considerable drop in that rat- ing; now the team could get much more out of Tom's gener- ally very good business judg- ment.
Tom is the exception. For most of us, such a transition is quite difficult. If you can't, for example, imagine that there's such a thing as being too results oriented (which might lead you to drive your team too hard) or too principled (and maybe preachy, judgmental, or intoler- ant), you're a poor candidate for change. But Tom had an open mind: As he put it, he found that he could be passion- ate without losing compassion; he could be right without being righteous.
Acknowledge your strengths overused.
As we noted earlier, it's not easy to spot strengths that you're overdoing. In our re- search sample, 55% of the man- agers were rated by coworkers as using too much of at least one leadership attribute, but the majority of those managers did not rate themselves as over- doing that attribute. The prob- lem is made worse on survey in- struments with a five-point rat- ing scale. One manager gave himself a five on "deci- sive--makes decisions in a timely fashion." His corre- sponding written comments didn't reflect any awareness of the downsides of decisiveness.
His coworkers rated him just as highly on decisiveness, but in later conversations they de- scribed him as "overwhelming" and cited his tendency to curtail discussion.
The leadership development field lets managers down by in- advertently neglecting to assess for overused strengths. Manag- ers like Tom are to be forgiven for perceiving a five--typically defined as "to a very great ex- tent"--as an excellent grade.
The hitch is that when your coworkers give you a rating of five on a leadership behavior, it might be an indication that you're taking that behavior too far--but the score alone doesn't explicitly signal over- kill.
Therefore, you need to find other ways to bring it to light.
You could start with a review of the highest ratings on your most recent 360 report. Ask yourself: Is this too much of a good thing? Ask coworkers what you overdo, or better yet, conduct a survey consisting of three questions: What should I do more? What should I do less? What should I continue doing? If you're still not sure, ask your spouse or a very close friend, who will probably know.
Another technique is to make a list of the qualities you most want to have as a leader. Are you overdoing any of them?
That's a tough question to an- swer, but it forces you to think in a new way, to challenge some of your assumptions about leadership and your abil- ities. Ask yourself as well whether you privately pride yourself on being superior to other leaders in any way. This is precisely the attribute that you're at risk of overdoing.
Checking for lopsidedness doesn't require an elaborate as- sessment tool. You can simply prompt feedback from other people with a list of quali- ties--one you compose or one you get off the shelf (drawing from the exhibit "Opposing Leadership Virtues," for exam- ple, or from John Kotter's dis- tinction between leadership and management in the classic HBR article "What Leaders Re- ally Do.")
And now the bigger chal- lenge: Trace overkill to its source, whether that's an unex- amined assumption that more is better or a set of overly high expectations. (Your spouse or a good friend can once again be a reliable source of information.)
Redirect your strengths.
The stronger your preference for one leadership style, the stronger your distaste for its op- posite. So-called servant lead- ers, for example, can't stand selfishness and are known for not taking good care of them- selves.
It would be unrealistic to suggest that everyone could be- come fully balanced. Our re- search tells us that only 5% of executives get it about right on forceful versus enabling leader- ship as well as strategic versus operational leadership. Most managers lean one way or another, and lopsidedness will hurt your own and your team's effectiveness. If you are ready to embrace a new mind-set and begin correcting your lopsided tendencies, you merely need to stop both overdoing a given at- tribute and underdoing its op- posite. That is, of course, a lot harder than it sounds.
The good news is, managers can sometimes reapply their strengths to recover their bal- ance. That's what we saw with Tom: His inherent determina- tion went from virtue to vice and back to virtue. Once he ac- cepted that others saw him as overly aggressive, he changed his behavior through sheer will, bolstered by knowing he had his colleagues' respect.
Consider also Maureen, an- other executive we've worked with, a general manager at an insurance company. Her strong preference for consensus build- ing made for overly long meet- ings that tried her team's pa- tience. Beyond a certain point, people wanted her to step in and decide. When she stopped shooting for agreement among the entire team, settling for eight out of 10, her meetings became much more produc- tive--and the two people who didn't agree didn't mind be- cause at least their views had been considered (and they got some time back in their day, to boot).
Overly enabling and insuffi- ciently forceful, Maureen was also lopsided on the strategic- operational duality. She was a star when it came to strategy, but her grasp of the big picture was undermined by her inabili- ty to implement. Specializing in strategic-enabling leadership, she operated at an overly high level and wasn't firm enough with people when they lost sight of broad goals or their progress was too slow. To im- plement her long-term plan, she needed to ramp up her forcefulness as well as her op- erational focus. Although it was uncomfortable, she made her- self become tougher on people who were falling short in their performance. She also got a lit- tle more involved in day-to-day execution but at the same time appointed a deputy general manager, a field-general type who had the strengths she lacked. As important as it is for senior leaders to keep raising their game, precious few can be all things to all people.
··· Managers are always at risk of being one-dimension- al--and often blind to what they sacrifice as a conse- quence. Your company may be able to help you mitigate the risks by holding up a mirror to your overused strengths and lopsided tendencies (arguably, you're owed the information), but you can't count on it. Now more than ever, it's your job to take control of your ca- reer--and it is in your power to manage your strengths so that they do not become weakness- es.
Robert E. Kaplan, based in New York, and Robert B. Kaiser, based in Greensboro, North Carolina, are partners at the leadership-consulting firm Kap- lan DeVries. They are the au- thors of The Versatile Leader: Make the Most of Your Strengths--Without Overdoing It (Pfeiffer, 2006) and have been awarded a patent for their 360 tool, the Leadership Versatility Index.
Source: Harvard Business Review, February 2009
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Cairn raises Rajasthan field estimates
The India unit of UK-based Cairn Energy Plc raised estimates of in-place reserves at its Rajasthan field, the country's largest onshore petro- leum deposit, to four billion bar- rels of oil equivalent from 3.7 bil- lion.
Cairn India Ltd also lifted its estimates on potential reserves to 6.5 billion barrels of oil equiva- lent from four billion on Tuesday.
As a result, “the recovery po- tential has doubled from 700 mil- lion barrels to 1,400 million bar- rels, with the plateau production increasing from 240,000 bpd (barrels per day) from the earlier approved plateau production of 175,000 bpd,“ said Rahul Dhir, chief executive of Cairn India.
However, the directorate gen- eral of hydrocarbons, the regula- tor, said it doesn't endorse such numbers. “We have received a copy of the report as prepared by the independent agency,“ said director general of hydrocarbons S.K. Srivastava. “The DGH does not certify contingent resources.
Contingent and prospective re- sources are futuristic resources.“
An official of state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corp. Ltd, which has a 30% stake in the Rajasthan field that's operated by Cairn In- dia, said the DGH hadn't ratified the new numbers, on condition of anonymity. Cairn India said it had informed the regulator of the revised estimates.
“There has been a significant increase in the prospective re- source base. All stakeholders in- cluding DGH were informed re- garding the revised estimates,“ Cairn India spokesperson Manu Kapoor said by email. “In addi- tion to a comprehensive internal review, (consultants) DeGolyer and MacNaughton have con- ducted an independent assess- ment of the majority of the leads and prospects in the prospective resources.“
Shares of Cairn India rose 3.76% on the Bombay Stock Ex- change to close at Rs292.80 on Tuesday. The benchmark Sensex index rose 0.23% to 17,451.02 points.
Cairn Energy jumped to a re- cord in London trading after an- nouncing the start of oil drilling in Greenland and forecasting higher output at its Rajasthan field. It climbed as much as 12% to 425.1 pence, the highest price since the stock began trading in 1989. The shares were at 418.5 pence as of 11:28am local time, valuing the Edinburgh-based company at £5.84 billion (8.75 billion).
Production of the waxy crude oil from the Rajasthan field is around 25,000 bpd, which the company expects to ramp up to 125,000 bpd by the second half of this year.
Cairn India has sales arrange- ments to supply 1,43,000 bpd to refiners such as Hindustan Pe- troleum Corp. Ltd, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd, Indian Oil Corp. Ltd, Reli- ance Industries Ltd and Essar Oil Ltd. Cairn has already made an investment of $4 billion in the Rajasthan field with an addition- al $2 billion to be invested over the next two years. “We are fully funded for the next phase,“ Dhir said.
Source:Livemint & Bloomberg
The India unit of UK-based Cairn Energy Plc raised estimates of in-place reserves at its Rajasthan field, the country's largest onshore petro- leum deposit, to four billion bar- rels of oil equivalent from 3.7 bil- lion.
Cairn India Ltd also lifted its estimates on potential reserves to 6.5 billion barrels of oil equiva- lent from four billion on Tuesday.
As a result, “the recovery po- tential has doubled from 700 mil- lion barrels to 1,400 million bar- rels, with the plateau production increasing from 240,000 bpd (barrels per day) from the earlier approved plateau production of 175,000 bpd,“ said Rahul Dhir, chief executive of Cairn India.
However, the directorate gen- eral of hydrocarbons, the regula- tor, said it doesn't endorse such numbers. “We have received a copy of the report as prepared by the independent agency,“ said director general of hydrocarbons S.K. Srivastava. “The DGH does not certify contingent resources.
Contingent and prospective re- sources are futuristic resources.“
An official of state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corp. Ltd, which has a 30% stake in the Rajasthan field that's operated by Cairn In- dia, said the DGH hadn't ratified the new numbers, on condition of anonymity. Cairn India said it had informed the regulator of the revised estimates.
“There has been a significant increase in the prospective re- source base. All stakeholders in- cluding DGH were informed re- garding the revised estimates,“ Cairn India spokesperson Manu Kapoor said by email. “In addi- tion to a comprehensive internal review, (consultants) DeGolyer and MacNaughton have con- ducted an independent assess- ment of the majority of the leads and prospects in the prospective resources.“
Shares of Cairn India rose 3.76% on the Bombay Stock Ex- change to close at Rs292.80 on Tuesday. The benchmark Sensex index rose 0.23% to 17,451.02 points.
Cairn Energy jumped to a re- cord in London trading after an- nouncing the start of oil drilling in Greenland and forecasting higher output at its Rajasthan field. It climbed as much as 12% to 425.1 pence, the highest price since the stock began trading in 1989. The shares were at 418.5 pence as of 11:28am local time, valuing the Edinburgh-based company at £5.84 billion (8.75 billion).
Production of the waxy crude oil from the Rajasthan field is around 25,000 bpd, which the company expects to ramp up to 125,000 bpd by the second half of this year.
Cairn India has sales arrange- ments to supply 1,43,000 bpd to refiners such as Hindustan Pe- troleum Corp. Ltd, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd, Indian Oil Corp. Ltd, Reli- ance Industries Ltd and Essar Oil Ltd. Cairn has already made an investment of $4 billion in the Rajasthan field with an addition- al $2 billion to be invested over the next two years. “We are fully funded for the next phase,“ Dhir said.
Source:Livemint & Bloomberg
Rs 300cr rev from Sikkim facility: Ipca Labs
In an interview with CNBC-TV18, AK Jain, ED, IPCA Laboratories, spoke about the benefits of the healthcare bill for formulation companies, and the company's business going forward.
Ipca Labs Q3 net profit up at Rs 58.2 cr
Q: You were also putting up a formulation facility at Sikkim when we last spoke with you, could you give us an update if the commencement has already taken place and what sort of revenue flow are you expecting from that facility?
A: In Sikkim we are investing around Rs 80 crore and at this facility construction work is in full flow and hopefully before December, this facility should be ready. We are largely putting this facility to take tax advantage long-term, which the company will get in terms of the 10-year tax holiday and 10-year excise holiday.
So it is a long period of advantage and at full capacity utilization that unit will also give around Rs 300 crore kind of turnover and largely the products produced from that particular front are either for the developing markets or for the Indian domestic market.
So the products will be produced for both these markets because we have both the US productions and European production coming from some other plant. So this plant will be purely dedicated for domestic as well as for the emerging markets.
In an interview with CNBC-TV18, AK Jain, ED, IPCA Laboratories, spoke about the benefits of the healthcare bill for formulation companies, and the company's business going forward.
Ipca Labs Q3 net profit up at Rs 58.2 cr
Q: You were also putting up a formulation facility at Sikkim when we last spoke with you, could you give us an update if the commencement has already taken place and what sort of revenue flow are you expecting from that facility?
A: In Sikkim we are investing around Rs 80 crore and at this facility construction work is in full flow and hopefully before December, this facility should be ready. We are largely putting this facility to take tax advantage long-term, which the company will get in terms of the 10-year tax holiday and 10-year excise holiday.
So it is a long period of advantage and at full capacity utilization that unit will also give around Rs 300 crore kind of turnover and largely the products produced from that particular front are either for the developing markets or for the Indian domestic market.
So the products will be produced for both these markets because we have both the US productions and European production coming from some other plant. So this plant will be purely dedicated for domestic as well as for the emerging markets.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Remarks of PM to the full Planning Commission
INDIA: Remarks of PM to the full Planning Commission meeting
The Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, chaired the Full Planning Commission meeting in New Delhi today. Following is the text of the Prime Minister’s opening remarks on the occasion:-
“I am very happy to open this meeting of the full Planning Commission to discuss the Mid Term Appraisal of the Eleventh Plan.
We have completed three years of the Eleventh Plan and the Mid Term Appraisal is a report card on our achievements in this period. It gives us an idea of how far we have been able to meet our stated objective of faster and more inclusive growth.
I have asked the Deputy Chairman to highlight some of the challenges emerging from the Appraisal in his presentation to this meeting. In my remarks, I will focus on the broad picture which should guide our discussions.
The Mid Term Appraisal brings out clearly the strengths of India’s economy and also the resilience it has shown during the global economic crisis. In the five years preceding the crisis in 2008-09, our economy grew at an average growth rate of nearly 9% per year. The rate of investment had increased nearly to 38% of GDP and was financed by a domestic saving rate of over 36 % of GDP. These high rates of investment and savings were accompanied by the growing dynamism and competitiveness of the private sector. Despite being hit by a global crisis of exceptional severity, we were able to maintain a growth rate averaging nearly 7% in the last two years.
Our strengths can help us return to the 9% growth trajectory by 2011-12. However, as the Mid Term Appraisal rightly emphasises, restoration of high growth should not be taken for granted.
The global environment is expected to remain difficult in the years that lie ahead and exports are likely to grow more slowly than they did before the crisis. We will need another source of demand to offset slower exports growth and that demand should ideally come from an expansion in investment in infrastructure, both in the rural areas and the economy in general.
Our concern for inclusiveness in the Eleventh Plan period is reflected in the fact that in addition to the 9% growth target, the Plan lists 26 other monitorable targets highlighting inclusiveness concerns. These include targets for agricultural growth, poverty reduction, employment generation, school enrolment, reduction in the gender gap, reduction in IMR and MMR, and access to clean drinking water.
We do not have all the data we need to measure progress in these dimensions during the first three years of the Eleventh Plan but the document before us presents a reasonable assessment of the overall position in these areas.
As far as agricultural growth is concerned, the severe drought we faced in 2009-10 has depressed the average performance in the first 3 years. However, the drought has been managed much better than in the past, with a much smaller negative effect on output. With a normal monsoon this year, we can expect a strong rebound in agricultural production. The Mid Term Appraisal suggests that agricultural growth will definitely be better than in the Tenth Plan. If we can ensure that the various schemes for supporting agriculture production, expanding irrigation and building rural infrastructure are implemented well in the remaining two years of the Plan, there is a good chance that agricultural growth may come close to the 4% target.
A very positive feature of developments in recent years is that the growth performance across states shows definite narrowing of dispersion. Data are only available upto 2008-09, but they do show that previously poorer performing states are also accelerating. Our policies have not helped only the advanced states; they are also helping the poorer states to improve their performance as well.
Our target for reducing poverty is to cut the percentage of the population below the poverty line by ten percentage points during the Plan period. This implies a pace of poverty reduction more than twice that experienced in the past. Our success in ensuring inclusive growth depends critically on how well we do in this dimension of perfomance.
The official estimates of poverty are based on the large sample NSS survey which was last conducted in 2004-05. The next estimate will be for 2009-10, based on the NSS survey which is currently being conducted. Estimates from this survey will be available by 2011. The question whether the high growth rate experienced in the period after 2004-05 has helped to reduce poverty can be answered confidently only after that.
Although we do not have data on poverty or even on employment after 2004-05, we do have assessments of the performance of the many schemes and programmes that are designed to achieve the objective of inclusiveness.
The most recent of these is the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, the largest Centrally Sponsored Scheme in the system with an annual outlay of around Rs 40,000 crore. The total employment generated through the MGNREG in 2009-10 is about three times the level achieved from the wage employment programmes in operation earlier in the country. The scheme has been well targeted, with more than half the beneficiaries being from the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes. It is has also been well balanced gender-wise, with women constituting about half the beneficiaries.
There are many other central government schemes which seek to push the inclusive growth agenda. These include the Sarva Shiksa Abhiyan and the Mid Day Meal Scheme, the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana, the Indira Awas Yojana, the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, the Integrated Child Development Services, the National Social Assistance Programme, the Total Sanitation Campaign, the Accelerated Rural Drinking Water Programme, and two new Eleventh Plan initiatives the National Rural Health Mission and the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana. In addition, there are a number of programmes specifically targeted to the needs of the Scheduled castes, the Scheduled Tribes and the Minorities.
The total expenditure in these schemes has increased steadily during the Eleventh Plan and has reached Rs.1,61,784 crore in 2010-11. I am happy to say that these efforts have produced progress towards the objectives intended. Rates of enrolment in primary schools have increased. Gender gaps in schooling are narrowing. Life expectancy rates of immunisation of children have increased. The percentage of population with access to safe drinking water has also gone up and so has village connectivity and electrification. But I must add that while there is progress, we have achieved less than what we need to.
The Mid Term Appraisal also brings out many deficiencies in the implementation of these schemes that need to be removed. Our focus must shift from making demands for more resources to expand schemes to undertaking a serious review of their effectiveness and improving the implementation on the ground.
Since all these service delivery oriented programmes are in areas that are the domain of the states, and indeed within the states in the domain of Panchayati Raj Institutions, the key to more efficient delivery lies in devolving power to the PRIs and also encouraging greater involvement of the people’s representatives in performing oversight functions and ensuring accountability.
The Mid Term Appraisal clearly brings out that while functions have been devolved in almost all states, there is little progress in the devolution of funds or even functionaries. In most states, functionaries at the PRI level are drawn from the Departmental cadres posted on deputation to the PRIs. The Appraisal brings out very clearly the need to build capacities at the local level both in the PRIs and the ULBs.
I would urge the Planning Commission to bring these issues to the forefront in the regular Annual Plan meetings with Chief Ministers
Let me conclude my observations by returning to the issue of infrastructure development. Deficiencies in infrastructure are a critical constraint on our ability to achieve faster growth and the Eleventh emphasises the role of expanding investment in infrastructure through a combination of expanded public investment combined with private investment wherever feasible.
The Plan has a target of increasing the investment in infrastructure from little under 6% in 2006-07 to 9% in 2011-12. The Mid Term Appraisal reports that total investment in infrastructure is likely do well because of a massive expansion beyond the original target in telecommunications, led by an investment boom in the private sector.
But, in all the other infrastructure areas investment will be short of the target. In some areas like power generation, the appraisal shows that private investment may exceed the target while the public sector may fall short of it. We must redouble our efforts to ensure that both the Centre and the states do well in the infrastructure sectors in the remaining period of the Plan.
To summarise, I think the Eleventh Plan made a good start which was interrupted by the global crisis. We have been able to weather the crisis reasonably well and should be able to return to a high growth path by the end of the Plan period.
I now request the Deputy Chairman to make his presentation of the specific challenges we face in the next two years.”
*********
The Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, chaired the Full Planning Commission meeting in New Delhi today. Following is the text of the Prime Minister’s opening remarks on the occasion:-
“I am very happy to open this meeting of the full Planning Commission to discuss the Mid Term Appraisal of the Eleventh Plan.
We have completed three years of the Eleventh Plan and the Mid Term Appraisal is a report card on our achievements in this period. It gives us an idea of how far we have been able to meet our stated objective of faster and more inclusive growth.
I have asked the Deputy Chairman to highlight some of the challenges emerging from the Appraisal in his presentation to this meeting. In my remarks, I will focus on the broad picture which should guide our discussions.
The Mid Term Appraisal brings out clearly the strengths of India’s economy and also the resilience it has shown during the global economic crisis. In the five years preceding the crisis in 2008-09, our economy grew at an average growth rate of nearly 9% per year. The rate of investment had increased nearly to 38% of GDP and was financed by a domestic saving rate of over 36 % of GDP. These high rates of investment and savings were accompanied by the growing dynamism and competitiveness of the private sector. Despite being hit by a global crisis of exceptional severity, we were able to maintain a growth rate averaging nearly 7% in the last two years.
Our strengths can help us return to the 9% growth trajectory by 2011-12. However, as the Mid Term Appraisal rightly emphasises, restoration of high growth should not be taken for granted.
The global environment is expected to remain difficult in the years that lie ahead and exports are likely to grow more slowly than they did before the crisis. We will need another source of demand to offset slower exports growth and that demand should ideally come from an expansion in investment in infrastructure, both in the rural areas and the economy in general.
Our concern for inclusiveness in the Eleventh Plan period is reflected in the fact that in addition to the 9% growth target, the Plan lists 26 other monitorable targets highlighting inclusiveness concerns. These include targets for agricultural growth, poverty reduction, employment generation, school enrolment, reduction in the gender gap, reduction in IMR and MMR, and access to clean drinking water.
We do not have all the data we need to measure progress in these dimensions during the first three years of the Eleventh Plan but the document before us presents a reasonable assessment of the overall position in these areas.
As far as agricultural growth is concerned, the severe drought we faced in 2009-10 has depressed the average performance in the first 3 years. However, the drought has been managed much better than in the past, with a much smaller negative effect on output. With a normal monsoon this year, we can expect a strong rebound in agricultural production. The Mid Term Appraisal suggests that agricultural growth will definitely be better than in the Tenth Plan. If we can ensure that the various schemes for supporting agriculture production, expanding irrigation and building rural infrastructure are implemented well in the remaining two years of the Plan, there is a good chance that agricultural growth may come close to the 4% target.
A very positive feature of developments in recent years is that the growth performance across states shows definite narrowing of dispersion. Data are only available upto 2008-09, but they do show that previously poorer performing states are also accelerating. Our policies have not helped only the advanced states; they are also helping the poorer states to improve their performance as well.
Our target for reducing poverty is to cut the percentage of the population below the poverty line by ten percentage points during the Plan period. This implies a pace of poverty reduction more than twice that experienced in the past. Our success in ensuring inclusive growth depends critically on how well we do in this dimension of perfomance.
The official estimates of poverty are based on the large sample NSS survey which was last conducted in 2004-05. The next estimate will be for 2009-10, based on the NSS survey which is currently being conducted. Estimates from this survey will be available by 2011. The question whether the high growth rate experienced in the period after 2004-05 has helped to reduce poverty can be answered confidently only after that.
Although we do not have data on poverty or even on employment after 2004-05, we do have assessments of the performance of the many schemes and programmes that are designed to achieve the objective of inclusiveness.
The most recent of these is the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, the largest Centrally Sponsored Scheme in the system with an annual outlay of around Rs 40,000 crore. The total employment generated through the MGNREG in 2009-10 is about three times the level achieved from the wage employment programmes in operation earlier in the country. The scheme has been well targeted, with more than half the beneficiaries being from the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes. It is has also been well balanced gender-wise, with women constituting about half the beneficiaries.
There are many other central government schemes which seek to push the inclusive growth agenda. These include the Sarva Shiksa Abhiyan and the Mid Day Meal Scheme, the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana, the Indira Awas Yojana, the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, the Integrated Child Development Services, the National Social Assistance Programme, the Total Sanitation Campaign, the Accelerated Rural Drinking Water Programme, and two new Eleventh Plan initiatives the National Rural Health Mission and the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana. In addition, there are a number of programmes specifically targeted to the needs of the Scheduled castes, the Scheduled Tribes and the Minorities.
The total expenditure in these schemes has increased steadily during the Eleventh Plan and has reached Rs.1,61,784 crore in 2010-11. I am happy to say that these efforts have produced progress towards the objectives intended. Rates of enrolment in primary schools have increased. Gender gaps in schooling are narrowing. Life expectancy rates of immunisation of children have increased. The percentage of population with access to safe drinking water has also gone up and so has village connectivity and electrification. But I must add that while there is progress, we have achieved less than what we need to.
The Mid Term Appraisal also brings out many deficiencies in the implementation of these schemes that need to be removed. Our focus must shift from making demands for more resources to expand schemes to undertaking a serious review of their effectiveness and improving the implementation on the ground.
Since all these service delivery oriented programmes are in areas that are the domain of the states, and indeed within the states in the domain of Panchayati Raj Institutions, the key to more efficient delivery lies in devolving power to the PRIs and also encouraging greater involvement of the people’s representatives in performing oversight functions and ensuring accountability.
The Mid Term Appraisal clearly brings out that while functions have been devolved in almost all states, there is little progress in the devolution of funds or even functionaries. In most states, functionaries at the PRI level are drawn from the Departmental cadres posted on deputation to the PRIs. The Appraisal brings out very clearly the need to build capacities at the local level both in the PRIs and the ULBs.
I would urge the Planning Commission to bring these issues to the forefront in the regular Annual Plan meetings with Chief Ministers
Let me conclude my observations by returning to the issue of infrastructure development. Deficiencies in infrastructure are a critical constraint on our ability to achieve faster growth and the Eleventh emphasises the role of expanding investment in infrastructure through a combination of expanded public investment combined with private investment wherever feasible.
The Plan has a target of increasing the investment in infrastructure from little under 6% in 2006-07 to 9% in 2011-12. The Mid Term Appraisal reports that total investment in infrastructure is likely do well because of a massive expansion beyond the original target in telecommunications, led by an investment boom in the private sector.
But, in all the other infrastructure areas investment will be short of the target. In some areas like power generation, the appraisal shows that private investment may exceed the target while the public sector may fall short of it. We must redouble our efforts to ensure that both the Centre and the states do well in the infrastructure sectors in the remaining period of the Plan.
To summarise, I think the Eleventh Plan made a good start which was interrupted by the global crisis. We have been able to weather the crisis reasonably well and should be able to return to a high growth path by the end of the Plan period.
I now request the Deputy Chairman to make his presentation of the specific challenges we face in the next two years.”
*********
bhutan: MoU for Sankosh Multipurpose Project in Bhutan
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
18:30 IST
THDC India Ltd has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Deptt. of Energy, Royal Govt. of Bhutan for updation of ‘Detailed Project Report’ (DPR) of 4060 MW Sankosh Multipurpose Project in Bhutan.
The MOU was signed by Shri R.S.T.Sai, CMD, THDC India Ltd and Shri Yeshi Wangdi, Director General, Royal Govt of Bhutan in the presence of Union Minister of Power and Minister of External Affairs, Royal Govt of Bhutan in New Delhi today.
Sankosh project is a part of the Govt of India’s initiative of developing 10,000MW of hydro power in Bhutan by year 2020 and constitutes almost 40% of total target.
THDC has been assigned the responsibility of updation of DPR of Sankosh Multipurpose Project (4060MW) and implementation of Bunakha HEP (180MW) in Bhutan. THDC has already established one of its units in Bhutan for executing these tasks.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
18:30 IST
THDC India Ltd has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Deptt. of Energy, Royal Govt. of Bhutan for updation of ‘Detailed Project Report’ (DPR) of 4060 MW Sankosh Multipurpose Project in Bhutan.
The MOU was signed by Shri R.S.T.Sai, CMD, THDC India Ltd and Shri Yeshi Wangdi, Director General, Royal Govt of Bhutan in the presence of Union Minister of Power and Minister of External Affairs, Royal Govt of Bhutan in New Delhi today.
Sankosh project is a part of the Govt of India’s initiative of developing 10,000MW of hydro power in Bhutan by year 2020 and constitutes almost 40% of total target.
THDC has been assigned the responsibility of updation of DPR of Sankosh Multipurpose Project (4060MW) and implementation of Bunakha HEP (180MW) in Bhutan. THDC has already established one of its units in Bhutan for executing these tasks.
NEED FOR CLEAN WATER
Polluted water kills more people than war: UN
Polluted drinking water claim more lives than all forms of violence, including war, a UN report has said, highlighting the need for clean water.
The report, released on the occasion of World Water Day by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) on Monday, said one child under the age of five dies every 20 seconds from water-related diseases.
According to the report titled ‘Sick Water’, the sheer scale of dirty water means more people now die from contaminated and polluted water than from all forms of violence including wars.
“These deaths are an affront to our common humanity, and undermine the efforts of many countries to achieve their development potential,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in his message marking Word Water Day.
“Day after day, we pour millions of tons of untreated sewage and industrial and agricultural wastes into the world’s water systems. And the poor continue to suffer first and most from pollution, water shortages and the lack of adequate sanitation.”
The report said that some two million tons of waste is being discharged daily into rivers and seas causing the spread of disease and damage of ecosystems.
The report has described wastewater as a “cocktail of fertilizer run-off and sewage disposal alongside animal, industrial, agricultural and other wastes”.
“If the world is to thrive, let alone to survive on a planet of six billion people heading to over nine billion by 2050, we need to get collectively smarter and more intelligent about how we manage waste including waste waters,” said Achim Steiner, the head of the UNEP.
“The facts and figures are stark - pollution from wastewater is quite literally killing people, indeed at least 1.8 million children die annually as a result of contaminated water,” he added.
Notably, the UN has declared 2005-2015 as the International Decade for Action “Water for Life.”
River pollution would remain a burden for the rural people of India for quite sometime, as the pollution is man-made, said Chief of Water and Environmental Sanitation of UNICEF, Lizette Burgers, here on Monday.
Speaking during a workshop on adaptive strategies for Water Conservation and Water Quality challenges as part of the celebrations to mark the World Water Day, Ms. Burgers said: “It will continue to be a burden to the rural people for quite sometime to come. Sources; previously considered to be not contaminated are being identified as contaminated by the time and new contaminants are also coming to light like heavy metals and radioactive elements. Many of these, if not ....most are most likely to be a result of manmade pollution.”
Ms. Burgers also said that India has a lot to be proud of as it has achieved a lot in the last couple of years. There have been positive developments in the area of water supply. India has already achieved its MDG target of 86 pr cent of access to improved sources of drinking water. However, there are many challenges in front of us. “We see that out of 150 million, 134 million living in rural India have no access to water. It is also critical to look at safety of water as it is directly linked to health and social stability.”
Polluted drinking water claim more lives than all forms of violence, including war, a UN report has said, highlighting the need for clean water.
The report, released on the occasion of World Water Day by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) on Monday, said one child under the age of five dies every 20 seconds from water-related diseases.
According to the report titled ‘Sick Water’, the sheer scale of dirty water means more people now die from contaminated and polluted water than from all forms of violence including wars.
“These deaths are an affront to our common humanity, and undermine the efforts of many countries to achieve their development potential,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in his message marking Word Water Day.
“Day after day, we pour millions of tons of untreated sewage and industrial and agricultural wastes into the world’s water systems. And the poor continue to suffer first and most from pollution, water shortages and the lack of adequate sanitation.”
The report said that some two million tons of waste is being discharged daily into rivers and seas causing the spread of disease and damage of ecosystems.
The report has described wastewater as a “cocktail of fertilizer run-off and sewage disposal alongside animal, industrial, agricultural and other wastes”.
“If the world is to thrive, let alone to survive on a planet of six billion people heading to over nine billion by 2050, we need to get collectively smarter and more intelligent about how we manage waste including waste waters,” said Achim Steiner, the head of the UNEP.
“The facts and figures are stark - pollution from wastewater is quite literally killing people, indeed at least 1.8 million children die annually as a result of contaminated water,” he added.
Notably, the UN has declared 2005-2015 as the International Decade for Action “Water for Life.”
River pollution would remain a burden for the rural people of India for quite sometime, as the pollution is man-made, said Chief of Water and Environmental Sanitation of UNICEF, Lizette Burgers, here on Monday.
Speaking during a workshop on adaptive strategies for Water Conservation and Water Quality challenges as part of the celebrations to mark the World Water Day, Ms. Burgers said: “It will continue to be a burden to the rural people for quite sometime to come. Sources; previously considered to be not contaminated are being identified as contaminated by the time and new contaminants are also coming to light like heavy metals and radioactive elements. Many of these, if not ....most are most likely to be a result of manmade pollution.”
Ms. Burgers also said that India has a lot to be proud of as it has achieved a lot in the last couple of years. There have been positive developments in the area of water supply. India has already achieved its MDG target of 86 pr cent of access to improved sources of drinking water. However, there are many challenges in front of us. “We see that out of 150 million, 134 million living in rural India have no access to water. It is also critical to look at safety of water as it is directly linked to health and social stability.”
Buy India long-term
» Bill Bonner is positive on India long term
» FII or FDI? What's better for India
» Buffett halo just got bigger
» India's PM bullish on GDP growth
It is not just the fickle minded and mostly short term oriented FIIs that are bullish on India. We were happy to know that there are some like Bill Bonner who are willing to consider India from a 10-year perspective. 'We are advising our clients to buy India long-term', Bill observed at the recently held Equitymaster Investment Summit 2010. This, coming from a person who is believed to be an astute observer of long term economic trends is indeed pleasing.
As Bill further notes, there is no difference between what a labourer does in US and what he does in India. Yet, the same person earns many times more there than here. The only reason the person in the US has an advantage is because countries like US and UK got a headstart over India. They benefited from the industrial revolution and hence built up a huge capital base. However, now the advantage is eroding and wage differentials are getting corrected. Thus, over the next few years, while real wages in developed countries could come down, those in emerging nations like India would go up and so would overall prosperity. Hence, India does like a very good long term bet to Bonner.
» Bill Bonner is positive on India long term
» FII or FDI? What's better for India
» Buffett halo just got bigger
» India's PM bullish on GDP growth
It is not just the fickle minded and mostly short term oriented FIIs that are bullish on India. We were happy to know that there are some like Bill Bonner who are willing to consider India from a 10-year perspective. 'We are advising our clients to buy India long-term', Bill observed at the recently held Equitymaster Investment Summit 2010. This, coming from a person who is believed to be an astute observer of long term economic trends is indeed pleasing.
As Bill further notes, there is no difference between what a labourer does in US and what he does in India. Yet, the same person earns many times more there than here. The only reason the person in the US has an advantage is because countries like US and UK got a headstart over India. They benefited from the industrial revolution and hence built up a huge capital base. However, now the advantage is eroding and wage differentials are getting corrected. Thus, over the next few years, while real wages in developed countries could come down, those in emerging nations like India would go up and so would overall prosperity. Hence, India does like a very good long term bet to Bonner.
PM inaugurates Conference on Building Infrastrcuture: Challenges and Opportunities
The Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh inaugurated the Conference on Building Infrastructure : Challenges and Opportunities in New Delhi today. Following is the text of the Prime Minister’s address on the occasion:
“It gives me great pleasure to inaugurate this conference on the challenges and opportunities of building infrastructure. I addressed the first such conference at this very venue three and a half years ago in the year 2006. A great deal has happened since then, much of it very positive. I am very happy to be here once again to speak on this issue, which is extremely relevant to our economic future.
India’s recent economic performance has been commendable on many counts. The economy grew at an average annual rate of about 9% before the global economic meltdown. It slowed down in 2008 because of the global crisis which continued into 2009, when it was compounded by a severe drought the country faced. Despite these adverse circumstances, our economy grew by 6.7% in fiscal year 2008-09, and it has accelerated to 7.2% in the fiscal year which is about to end in a few days time. These rates are well above those seen in the developed worlds, and reflect the underlying strengths of our economy. We expect to achieve 8.5% growth rate in the year 2010-11 and I hope we can achieve a growth rate of 9% in the year 2011-12.
I believe that we need to do even better. For eliminating poverty and providing productive employment for our young population in the near future, we must aim at accelerating the pace of economic growth to about 10% per annum. This is the growth target which we should work towards for the Twelfth Five Year Plan.
A growth rate of 10% looks ambitious but it is not impossible. It has been achieved by other emerging economies in Asia. However, it is not something that will happen automatically. We would need continual improvements in our policy regime and in our implementation procedures. Later today, I will be reviewing these issues in a meeting of the full Planning Commission to discuss the Mid Term Appraisal of the Eleventh Five Year Plan. For now, I will focus only on infrastructure development and what it requires in the years that lie ahead.
Let me begin by clarifying that when I say infrastructure, I do not mean only infrastructure for the modern part of our economy. For truly inclusive growth, we need to meet the infrastructure needs of the whole country. Infrastructure must therefore be defined broadly to include highways and roads of all kinds including rural roads, railways, air and water transport, irrigation, electric power, telecommunications, water supply and sewerage system.
The Eleventh Plan had estimated that we would need to invest over Rs.20 lakh crore in infrastructure over the five year period. This was more than double the realised investment during the Tenth Five Year Plan. The Plan also recognised that such a large investment in infrastructure could not be funded from public resources alone. This is because the government would have to necessarily devote a large portion of its own resources to critical livelihood support programmes and to providing access to education and health services which are crucial to ensuring inclusiveness of the growth process.
The strategy for infrastructure development therefore involved combination of public investment supplemented by private investments wherever feasible. The mix was expected to vary from sector to sector, and also from region to region.
Our experience shows that private participation in infrastructure development is indeed a feasible proposition and can help expand infrastructure much faster than it would have relying only on public resources. The telecom sector is the most compelling example of this proposition. The Eleventh Plan target for tele-density was realised ahead of schedule, in the third year of the Plan itself. The addition of 1 crore subscribers every month with user charges among the lowest in the world, has really taken the communication revolution to the doorstep of the ‘aam aadmi’. We have also seen many successful PPP projects in roads, ports, airports and electric power. We need to do much more in these areas.
The Central Government has developed a fairly robust framework for PPPs which balances the legitimate requirements of the investors and the needs of the users and also ensures transparency. Model documents have been developed for several sectors. Projects are awarded on the basis of competitive bidding and standardisation of documents and the bidding processes have contributed greatly to the promotion of transparency.
One of the reasons why it is difficult to attract private investment in infrastructure is that all projects may not be able to generate adequate revenue streams. The projects may have high economic rates of returns but may not be financially viable. The Central Government has dealt with this problem by offering a capital subsidy which is competitively determined through the bidding processes. Since the capital subsidy is only a proportion of the total capital cost, government resources effectively leverage a large volume of private resources. This Viability Gap Funding arrangement can be accessed by state governments as well. The scheme has been received well and a large number of PPP projects have been approved under this scheme.
I am happy to note that our states are now actively pursuing infrastructure projects, including through PPP arrangements. Some of the states have made notable progress in this area, while others are at earlier stages. The Finance Ministry and the Planning Commission are actively engaged with the state governments to help them in managing the PPP process.
You will be hearing directly from my colleagues in charge of the various infrastructure sectors about developments in each sector. I will therefore only touch briefly on these.
The power sector is crucial for fuelling the 10% growth we are aiming at. The capacity addition achieved already in the Eleventh Plan period is much higher than the achievement anytime in the past. But we have made less progress in this area than we should have. Power shortages remain a problem in many parts of our country. The distribution segment, which is entirely in the states sector, continues to be fragile.
We are trying to tackle the problem of high Transmission & Distribution losses through a restructured Accelerated Power Development and Reform Programme which has just begun to roll out. We must also take steps to operationalise open access as early as possible to enable bulk consumers to buy electricity directly from competing producers so that a vibrant market is created where producers can invest for eliminating shortages and also reduce tariffs through competition.
In the roads sector, we are very seriously working towards accelerating the road building programme in all parts of our country, especially the north-eastern states and the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Some changes have been made in the terms of concessions responding to stakeholder feedback, and with these changes we expect strong investor interest in PPP road projects.
The Delhi-Mumbai and Ludhiana-Kolkata dedicated rail freight corridors are a transformative initiative of the Indian Railways. While much of the investment in the railways is necessarily in the public sector, PPPs have nevertheless been envisaged in many areas. Metro rail projects are being increasingly pursued in many cities, through various models including PPPs.
The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission is designed to bring in a quantum improvement in urban infrastructure. I would urge the states to actively identify and pursue the possibilities of PPP in all segments of urban infrastructure which require both expansion and upgradation.
In civil aviation, Delhi and Mumbai airports are currently undergoing a complete transformation while airports at Hyderabad and Bangalore have already been completed and operationalised through PPP. The Airport Authority of India is also upgrading several of its airports including the two metro airports at Kolkata and Chennai.
The government has also initiated an ambitious plan for expansion of the port sector, including through PPPs.
Issues involving the logistics sector need to be seen in a holistic manner. We have constituted a High Level Committee under the chairmanship of Dr Rakesh Mohan to prepare an integrated plan for the development of the transport sector in our economy.
I have already mentioned that our strategy of inclusiveness requires high priority to the social sectors, especially education and health. While these efforts will have to be primarily in the public sector, there may be merit in bringing in public private partnership in these areas as well. We need to work on PPP models in these sectors that are fully consistent with the objective of providing access to the underprivileged sections of our society.
Effective private sector participation in infrastructure would require a large mobilisation of resources through our financial institutions. The Finance Ministry has taken several initiatives in this regard. Preliminary exercises suggest that investment in infrastructure will have to expand to $ 1000 billion in the Twelfth Five Year Plan. I urge the Finance Ministry and the Planning Commission to draw up a plan of action for achieving this level of investment.
We also need to review the approach that should guide our regulatory institutions in different sectors. An Approach Paper on the subject was published by the Planning Commission after extensive consultations with experts and stakeholders. I have asked the Commission to prepare a draft bill outlining the next stage of regulatory reform. We would welcome the views of all stakeholders in this very important area.
Finally, I must emphasise that a successful infrastructure development strategy depends crucially and critically on implementation. Both the Centre and the states have to give top priority to strengthen implementation capabilities. We have set up the Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure to monitor progress in this area. I have asked the Planning Commission to engage in detailed consultations with each of the infrastructure ministries and come up with agreed targets of achievement for each Ministry, in order to identify slippages at early stages and take corrective action as necessary. I would urge the states to adopt similar tight monitoring so that we achieve the best possible outcome in the remaining two years of the present Eleventh Five Year Plan.
With these words, I once again wish your deliberations all success.”
The Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh inaugurated the Conference on Building Infrastructure : Challenges and Opportunities in New Delhi today. Following is the text of the Prime Minister’s address on the occasion:
“It gives me great pleasure to inaugurate this conference on the challenges and opportunities of building infrastructure. I addressed the first such conference at this very venue three and a half years ago in the year 2006. A great deal has happened since then, much of it very positive. I am very happy to be here once again to speak on this issue, which is extremely relevant to our economic future.
India’s recent economic performance has been commendable on many counts. The economy grew at an average annual rate of about 9% before the global economic meltdown. It slowed down in 2008 because of the global crisis which continued into 2009, when it was compounded by a severe drought the country faced. Despite these adverse circumstances, our economy grew by 6.7% in fiscal year 2008-09, and it has accelerated to 7.2% in the fiscal year which is about to end in a few days time. These rates are well above those seen in the developed worlds, and reflect the underlying strengths of our economy. We expect to achieve 8.5% growth rate in the year 2010-11 and I hope we can achieve a growth rate of 9% in the year 2011-12.
I believe that we need to do even better. For eliminating poverty and providing productive employment for our young population in the near future, we must aim at accelerating the pace of economic growth to about 10% per annum. This is the growth target which we should work towards for the Twelfth Five Year Plan.
A growth rate of 10% looks ambitious but it is not impossible. It has been achieved by other emerging economies in Asia. However, it is not something that will happen automatically. We would need continual improvements in our policy regime and in our implementation procedures. Later today, I will be reviewing these issues in a meeting of the full Planning Commission to discuss the Mid Term Appraisal of the Eleventh Five Year Plan. For now, I will focus only on infrastructure development and what it requires in the years that lie ahead.
Let me begin by clarifying that when I say infrastructure, I do not mean only infrastructure for the modern part of our economy. For truly inclusive growth, we need to meet the infrastructure needs of the whole country. Infrastructure must therefore be defined broadly to include highways and roads of all kinds including rural roads, railways, air and water transport, irrigation, electric power, telecommunications, water supply and sewerage system.
The Eleventh Plan had estimated that we would need to invest over Rs.20 lakh crore in infrastructure over the five year period. This was more than double the realised investment during the Tenth Five Year Plan. The Plan also recognised that such a large investment in infrastructure could not be funded from public resources alone. This is because the government would have to necessarily devote a large portion of its own resources to critical livelihood support programmes and to providing access to education and health services which are crucial to ensuring inclusiveness of the growth process.
The strategy for infrastructure development therefore involved combination of public investment supplemented by private investments wherever feasible. The mix was expected to vary from sector to sector, and also from region to region.
Our experience shows that private participation in infrastructure development is indeed a feasible proposition and can help expand infrastructure much faster than it would have relying only on public resources. The telecom sector is the most compelling example of this proposition. The Eleventh Plan target for tele-density was realised ahead of schedule, in the third year of the Plan itself. The addition of 1 crore subscribers every month with user charges among the lowest in the world, has really taken the communication revolution to the doorstep of the ‘aam aadmi’. We have also seen many successful PPP projects in roads, ports, airports and electric power. We need to do much more in these areas.
The Central Government has developed a fairly robust framework for PPPs which balances the legitimate requirements of the investors and the needs of the users and also ensures transparency. Model documents have been developed for several sectors. Projects are awarded on the basis of competitive bidding and standardisation of documents and the bidding processes have contributed greatly to the promotion of transparency.
One of the reasons why it is difficult to attract private investment in infrastructure is that all projects may not be able to generate adequate revenue streams. The projects may have high economic rates of returns but may not be financially viable. The Central Government has dealt with this problem by offering a capital subsidy which is competitively determined through the bidding processes. Since the capital subsidy is only a proportion of the total capital cost, government resources effectively leverage a large volume of private resources. This Viability Gap Funding arrangement can be accessed by state governments as well. The scheme has been received well and a large number of PPP projects have been approved under this scheme.
I am happy to note that our states are now actively pursuing infrastructure projects, including through PPP arrangements. Some of the states have made notable progress in this area, while others are at earlier stages. The Finance Ministry and the Planning Commission are actively engaged with the state governments to help them in managing the PPP process.
You will be hearing directly from my colleagues in charge of the various infrastructure sectors about developments in each sector. I will therefore only touch briefly on these.
The power sector is crucial for fuelling the 10% growth we are aiming at. The capacity addition achieved already in the Eleventh Plan period is much higher than the achievement anytime in the past. But we have made less progress in this area than we should have. Power shortages remain a problem in many parts of our country. The distribution segment, which is entirely in the states sector, continues to be fragile.
We are trying to tackle the problem of high Transmission & Distribution losses through a restructured Accelerated Power Development and Reform Programme which has just begun to roll out. We must also take steps to operationalise open access as early as possible to enable bulk consumers to buy electricity directly from competing producers so that a vibrant market is created where producers can invest for eliminating shortages and also reduce tariffs through competition.
In the roads sector, we are very seriously working towards accelerating the road building programme in all parts of our country, especially the north-eastern states and the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Some changes have been made in the terms of concessions responding to stakeholder feedback, and with these changes we expect strong investor interest in PPP road projects.
The Delhi-Mumbai and Ludhiana-Kolkata dedicated rail freight corridors are a transformative initiative of the Indian Railways. While much of the investment in the railways is necessarily in the public sector, PPPs have nevertheless been envisaged in many areas. Metro rail projects are being increasingly pursued in many cities, through various models including PPPs.
The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission is designed to bring in a quantum improvement in urban infrastructure. I would urge the states to actively identify and pursue the possibilities of PPP in all segments of urban infrastructure which require both expansion and upgradation.
In civil aviation, Delhi and Mumbai airports are currently undergoing a complete transformation while airports at Hyderabad and Bangalore have already been completed and operationalised through PPP. The Airport Authority of India is also upgrading several of its airports including the two metro airports at Kolkata and Chennai.
The government has also initiated an ambitious plan for expansion of the port sector, including through PPPs.
Issues involving the logistics sector need to be seen in a holistic manner. We have constituted a High Level Committee under the chairmanship of Dr Rakesh Mohan to prepare an integrated plan for the development of the transport sector in our economy.
I have already mentioned that our strategy of inclusiveness requires high priority to the social sectors, especially education and health. While these efforts will have to be primarily in the public sector, there may be merit in bringing in public private partnership in these areas as well. We need to work on PPP models in these sectors that are fully consistent with the objective of providing access to the underprivileged sections of our society.
Effective private sector participation in infrastructure would require a large mobilisation of resources through our financial institutions. The Finance Ministry has taken several initiatives in this regard. Preliminary exercises suggest that investment in infrastructure will have to expand to $ 1000 billion in the Twelfth Five Year Plan. I urge the Finance Ministry and the Planning Commission to draw up a plan of action for achieving this level of investment.
We also need to review the approach that should guide our regulatory institutions in different sectors. An Approach Paper on the subject was published by the Planning Commission after extensive consultations with experts and stakeholders. I have asked the Commission to prepare a draft bill outlining the next stage of regulatory reform. We would welcome the views of all stakeholders in this very important area.
Finally, I must emphasise that a successful infrastructure development strategy depends crucially and critically on implementation. Both the Centre and the states have to give top priority to strengthen implementation capabilities. We have set up the Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure to monitor progress in this area. I have asked the Planning Commission to engage in detailed consultations with each of the infrastructure ministries and come up with agreed targets of achievement for each Ministry, in order to identify slippages at early stages and take corrective action as necessary. I would urge the states to adopt similar tight monitoring so that we achieve the best possible outcome in the remaining two years of the present Eleventh Five Year Plan.
With these words, I once again wish your deliberations all success.”
PEACE AND CONFLICT STUDIES: Introduction and Rationale
source:THE HIMALAYAN BEACON [BEACON ONLINE]
BY DR SATYABRAT SINHA
(Dr Sinha teaches in the Department of Peace and Conflict Studies and Management, Sikkim University, Gangtok)
When I tell people that I teach Peace and Conflict Studies, it evokes an all knowing reaction punctuated by an exclamation. At a social occasion, someone retorted, so you teach religion, I could only react passively not knowing the basis of judgment. The anecdote is to essentially suggest that most have little idea of the discipline of Peace Studies, Conflict Resolution or as the department at Sikkim University is called Peace and Conflict Studies. Though, living in dangerous times and in our specific location in South Asia, everyone is generally unaware of the essence of the words Peace and Conflict. For many the idea of Peace is internal, philosophical, the peace of mind, for others, it means absence of violence or war. Beyond which unfortunately there appears to be little knowledge on what the discipline might be engaged with. The essay you are reading is an effort towards addressing that knowledge gap and creating awareness about the discipline. Peace and Conflict Studies is now taught at the Masters level in many Universities worldwide and six Universities across India.
A cursory look at statistics would emphasize the dire need for a discipline which would actively make Peace its business. In the period, 1945-1989, after the Second World War and the end of the cold war, there were over 21.8 million war deaths out of which 85% were civilians, people like you and your neighbour, people who are not combatants, not trained to fight or kill. In the preceding period of the two world wars, 1914-1945, often termed the bloodiest century, the civilian deaths were at 50%. So increasingly and despite the ‘Peace’ of the Cold War, we have had a dramatic increase in civilian deaths due to violent conflicts. It would also be pertinent to remember that death is but a fraction of the people injured, maimed, of material damage to civilian economy and the further damage to health and life in direct and delayed ways. These figures are not meant to scare you; rather they are intended to drive home the seriousness of the situation. Further, majority of conflicts today are in the global, East and South, in our part of the world.
It is here that Peace and Conflict Studies (PCS) finds its place. PCS is an inter-disciplinary effort at the prevention, de-escalation and resolution of conflict by peaceful means. In other words, Conflict Resolution attempts to minimize violence in a conflict, overcome antagonisms between adversaries and find outcomes and settlements acceptable to all and which are enduring.
The normative basis of the discipline states that Peace is a natural condition and the prime force of human behavior while war is an aberration. Peace is defined as ‘not violence’. Then, what is violence? We all seem to have an understanding of violence, expression of force whether, physical or verbal. Violence is defined in two ways, direct violence and indirect violence. Direct or overt violence is the visible act of violence when a policeman hits at a protester, when two people are involved in a physical fight.
Indirect violence may not be visible and may be masked in the way society is organized as in through economic inequalities, caste and racial discrimination in which the development potential of an individual is denied. Indirect violence is further of two types, Structural Violence and Cultural Violence. Structural violence is that which limits, prohibits an individual from achieving their potential. Malnutrition, injustice, discrimination, lack of access to education and economic opportunity are examples of structural violence. If a person has the potential to grow up to be a football player and cannot due to preventable reasons like poverty or a preventable disease, it is termed structural violence. Cultural Violence is indirect violence, discrimination and injustice inflicted on a person on the bases of cultural assumptions, color, caste, tribe, race or religion.
Peace is, therefore, defined by the insights drawn from the above understanding of violence. One definition of Peace drawing from direct violence is that peace is the absence of violence or war, this has been termed negative peace. The other definition is that Peace, is of course, the absence of violence or war but also the presence of justice, equality and opportunity, wherein each individual can seek to achieve his ambition, this is called positive Peace. The two definitions flow out of the experiences amalgamated by world society. There have been instances when certain societies were not violent nor at war but due to indirect violence of either the structural or cultural sorts, such societies were denying the rights of individuals from realizing their potential, the apartheid regime in South Africa and caste discrimination in India are two examples.
Now, we will look at the meaning of Conflict. Conflict, is ambiguous and it means different things in different contexts, a debate, a disagreement, an argument, a battle or a state of unrest, turmoil or chaos. Conflict is also a word which is used to characterize situations in different social settings from inner emotional turmoil, psychological processes of individuals to relationships within and between groups, states or cultures. But what can be observed is that conflict usually has a negative connotation, it means the opposite of cooperation, harmony, accord or peace. We also associate conflict with violence and many also use it to mean violence. Conflict is seen as destructive, undesirable and a social aberration to be avoided, contained or eliminated.
From the Peace Studies perspective, this is a rather narrow, one dimensional account of conflict and also unhelpful. It does not allow us to distinguish between different levels of conflicts, its various forms or the many causes involved, nor does it help us think clearly about it. To resolve conflicts, we need to first understand them. Conflict is a multi-dimensional social phenomenon and it is an integral feature of human existence. Conflict is also essential to history, social change and transformation; an example would be the banner of revolt unfurled by the Indian National Congress demanding freedom from British rule. Conflict is also an everyday occurrence, a disagreement, incompatibility of goals, it is natural and unavoidable. The aims of Peace Studies are to find ways to express conflict behavior constructively, essentially through non-violent means. So we define Conflict as arising when parties disagree about the distribution of resources and act on the basis of these perceived incompatibilities.
We will now, briefly, examine the origins and growth of the discipline to inform ourselves better. Peace Studies as a discipline traces its origins to the start of student clubs opposing the civil war in mid-19th century United States. In these early years, both in Northern Europe and North America, periods of wars resulted, in the students pushing colleges to pay attention to the problems caused by war and Peace movements grew out of these efforts. The first department was established in 1948 by the Brethern Chruch in Manchester College, Indiana, United States. In the subsequent years, the two World Wars, Cold War, the threat of nuclear annihilation and the Vietnam War all helped generate the push in the development of Peace Studies.
The historical details and the conceptual clarifications are meant to induce an interest in the discipline. So what then is the relevance of Peace Studies in our lives today, in our Darjeeling- Sikkim region in the 21st century? This would be the right moment to assert that the concern of Peace Studies is everything which involves the question of Peace, just like all aspects related to material welfare lie in the realm of economics. From the means and methods to resolving existing conflicts, identifying and preventing future conflicts, in order to promote a more humane and rational approach to what is an inherent social phenomenon.
In Sikkim, the fractious issue of the hydel projects and its impact on the environment, the episodic communal polarization, the concerns of the survival of cultural identities in the context of increasing economic growth and migration, these are all concerns which can be addressed in a creative nonviolent manner if one is trained in Peace and Conflict techniques and methods. Sikkim’s peace provides a context for generating creative interventions in the conflicts of the vicinity, in Gorkhaland and the Naxal areas, across the national border in Nepal and in many other emerging issue areas like the exploitation of natural resources and its impact on the economy and livelihood for people.
Peace Studies believes that Peace is the correct way and towards such ends it focuses on conflicts- individuals, groups and nations in order to understand and then provide prescriptions for its amelioration. The Department of Peace and Conflict Studies, Sikkim University, offers a two year Masters program and six years Research Program (M.Phil/PhD) in Peace and Conflict Studies. The Masters program organized over four semester’s offers intensive classroom teaching and field studies in the tools of the discipline and over various areas such as Gender, Media, North East India, South Asia, Environment, Development and Globalization. Our methods of instruction are interactive and technology driven, the University provides many opportunities for the students to widen their scope and horizon of thinking through visiting academics from India and abroad, workshops on local conflicts, weekly documentary/movies and talk shows by various experts on their respective fields.
The employment opportunities that would be available to a student with a Peace and Conflict Studies degree are multiple and exciting. The intensive course work will help build skills and the awareness that the academic program will inculcate in the student, will make him/her a value added recruit for any organization working in the political/socio-economic arena. The career options range from civil and state services, journalism, publishing, research, teaching, corporation/consultancies, International Organisations and the NGO sectors. The program strives to educate and sensitize to bring about a difference to the world through any professional path the student may pursue.
source:THE HIMALAYAN BEACON [BEACON ONLINE]
BY DR SATYABRAT SINHA
(Dr Sinha teaches in the Department of Peace and Conflict Studies and Management, Sikkim University, Gangtok)
When I tell people that I teach Peace and Conflict Studies, it evokes an all knowing reaction punctuated by an exclamation. At a social occasion, someone retorted, so you teach religion, I could only react passively not knowing the basis of judgment. The anecdote is to essentially suggest that most have little idea of the discipline of Peace Studies, Conflict Resolution or as the department at Sikkim University is called Peace and Conflict Studies. Though, living in dangerous times and in our specific location in South Asia, everyone is generally unaware of the essence of the words Peace and Conflict. For many the idea of Peace is internal, philosophical, the peace of mind, for others, it means absence of violence or war. Beyond which unfortunately there appears to be little knowledge on what the discipline might be engaged with. The essay you are reading is an effort towards addressing that knowledge gap and creating awareness about the discipline. Peace and Conflict Studies is now taught at the Masters level in many Universities worldwide and six Universities across India.
A cursory look at statistics would emphasize the dire need for a discipline which would actively make Peace its business. In the period, 1945-1989, after the Second World War and the end of the cold war, there were over 21.8 million war deaths out of which 85% were civilians, people like you and your neighbour, people who are not combatants, not trained to fight or kill. In the preceding period of the two world wars, 1914-1945, often termed the bloodiest century, the civilian deaths were at 50%. So increasingly and despite the ‘Peace’ of the Cold War, we have had a dramatic increase in civilian deaths due to violent conflicts. It would also be pertinent to remember that death is but a fraction of the people injured, maimed, of material damage to civilian economy and the further damage to health and life in direct and delayed ways. These figures are not meant to scare you; rather they are intended to drive home the seriousness of the situation. Further, majority of conflicts today are in the global, East and South, in our part of the world.
It is here that Peace and Conflict Studies (PCS) finds its place. PCS is an inter-disciplinary effort at the prevention, de-escalation and resolution of conflict by peaceful means. In other words, Conflict Resolution attempts to minimize violence in a conflict, overcome antagonisms between adversaries and find outcomes and settlements acceptable to all and which are enduring.
The normative basis of the discipline states that Peace is a natural condition and the prime force of human behavior while war is an aberration. Peace is defined as ‘not violence’. Then, what is violence? We all seem to have an understanding of violence, expression of force whether, physical or verbal. Violence is defined in two ways, direct violence and indirect violence. Direct or overt violence is the visible act of violence when a policeman hits at a protester, when two people are involved in a physical fight.
Indirect violence may not be visible and may be masked in the way society is organized as in through economic inequalities, caste and racial discrimination in which the development potential of an individual is denied. Indirect violence is further of two types, Structural Violence and Cultural Violence. Structural violence is that which limits, prohibits an individual from achieving their potential. Malnutrition, injustice, discrimination, lack of access to education and economic opportunity are examples of structural violence. If a person has the potential to grow up to be a football player and cannot due to preventable reasons like poverty or a preventable disease, it is termed structural violence. Cultural Violence is indirect violence, discrimination and injustice inflicted on a person on the bases of cultural assumptions, color, caste, tribe, race or religion.
Peace is, therefore, defined by the insights drawn from the above understanding of violence. One definition of Peace drawing from direct violence is that peace is the absence of violence or war, this has been termed negative peace. The other definition is that Peace, is of course, the absence of violence or war but also the presence of justice, equality and opportunity, wherein each individual can seek to achieve his ambition, this is called positive Peace. The two definitions flow out of the experiences amalgamated by world society. There have been instances when certain societies were not violent nor at war but due to indirect violence of either the structural or cultural sorts, such societies were denying the rights of individuals from realizing their potential, the apartheid regime in South Africa and caste discrimination in India are two examples.
Now, we will look at the meaning of Conflict. Conflict, is ambiguous and it means different things in different contexts, a debate, a disagreement, an argument, a battle or a state of unrest, turmoil or chaos. Conflict is also a word which is used to characterize situations in different social settings from inner emotional turmoil, psychological processes of individuals to relationships within and between groups, states or cultures. But what can be observed is that conflict usually has a negative connotation, it means the opposite of cooperation, harmony, accord or peace. We also associate conflict with violence and many also use it to mean violence. Conflict is seen as destructive, undesirable and a social aberration to be avoided, contained or eliminated.
From the Peace Studies perspective, this is a rather narrow, one dimensional account of conflict and also unhelpful. It does not allow us to distinguish between different levels of conflicts, its various forms or the many causes involved, nor does it help us think clearly about it. To resolve conflicts, we need to first understand them. Conflict is a multi-dimensional social phenomenon and it is an integral feature of human existence. Conflict is also essential to history, social change and transformation; an example would be the banner of revolt unfurled by the Indian National Congress demanding freedom from British rule. Conflict is also an everyday occurrence, a disagreement, incompatibility of goals, it is natural and unavoidable. The aims of Peace Studies are to find ways to express conflict behavior constructively, essentially through non-violent means. So we define Conflict as arising when parties disagree about the distribution of resources and act on the basis of these perceived incompatibilities.
We will now, briefly, examine the origins and growth of the discipline to inform ourselves better. Peace Studies as a discipline traces its origins to the start of student clubs opposing the civil war in mid-19th century United States. In these early years, both in Northern Europe and North America, periods of wars resulted, in the students pushing colleges to pay attention to the problems caused by war and Peace movements grew out of these efforts. The first department was established in 1948 by the Brethern Chruch in Manchester College, Indiana, United States. In the subsequent years, the two World Wars, Cold War, the threat of nuclear annihilation and the Vietnam War all helped generate the push in the development of Peace Studies.
The historical details and the conceptual clarifications are meant to induce an interest in the discipline. So what then is the relevance of Peace Studies in our lives today, in our Darjeeling- Sikkim region in the 21st century? This would be the right moment to assert that the concern of Peace Studies is everything which involves the question of Peace, just like all aspects related to material welfare lie in the realm of economics. From the means and methods to resolving existing conflicts, identifying and preventing future conflicts, in order to promote a more humane and rational approach to what is an inherent social phenomenon.
In Sikkim, the fractious issue of the hydel projects and its impact on the environment, the episodic communal polarization, the concerns of the survival of cultural identities in the context of increasing economic growth and migration, these are all concerns which can be addressed in a creative nonviolent manner if one is trained in Peace and Conflict techniques and methods. Sikkim’s peace provides a context for generating creative interventions in the conflicts of the vicinity, in Gorkhaland and the Naxal areas, across the national border in Nepal and in many other emerging issue areas like the exploitation of natural resources and its impact on the economy and livelihood for people.
Peace Studies believes that Peace is the correct way and towards such ends it focuses on conflicts- individuals, groups and nations in order to understand and then provide prescriptions for its amelioration. The Department of Peace and Conflict Studies, Sikkim University, offers a two year Masters program and six years Research Program (M.Phil/PhD) in Peace and Conflict Studies. The Masters program organized over four semester’s offers intensive classroom teaching and field studies in the tools of the discipline and over various areas such as Gender, Media, North East India, South Asia, Environment, Development and Globalization. Our methods of instruction are interactive and technology driven, the University provides many opportunities for the students to widen their scope and horizon of thinking through visiting academics from India and abroad, workshops on local conflicts, weekly documentary/movies and talk shows by various experts on their respective fields.
The employment opportunities that would be available to a student with a Peace and Conflict Studies degree are multiple and exciting. The intensive course work will help build skills and the awareness that the academic program will inculcate in the student, will make him/her a value added recruit for any organization working in the political/socio-economic arena. The career options range from civil and state services, journalism, publishing, research, teaching, corporation/consultancies, International Organisations and the NGO sectors. The program strives to educate and sensitize to bring about a difference to the world through any professional path the student may pursue.
Steel prices may rise next fiscal
Steel prices may rise next fiscal
New Delhi: Steel prices in the country are set to go up on account of rising input costs and demand for the commodity, an industry expert said here on Wednesday. “Cost of raw material, including iron ore and coking coal is expected to go up by 25-30 per cent in the next financial year from the current level putting pressure on steel makers to pass on the burden to consumers,” Tata Steel Chief of Procurement Amitabh Panda told reporters.
Unlike the West, where steel demand is still recovering from the impact of the economic slowdown, he said, in India, steel producers would be able to pass on the input cost pressure to the consumers as off-takes are steadily growing. “Indian steel producers have to price their products higher in the next fiscal,” Panda added.
He further said the rising raw material costs are of “huge concern for bottom lines” of domestic steel firms and the 8-9 per cent growth in steel consumption would help ease pressure on manufacturers’ margins. (Agencies)
New Delhi: Steel prices in the country are set to go up on account of rising input costs and demand for the commodity, an industry expert said here on Wednesday. “Cost of raw material, including iron ore and coking coal is expected to go up by 25-30 per cent in the next financial year from the current level putting pressure on steel makers to pass on the burden to consumers,” Tata Steel Chief of Procurement Amitabh Panda told reporters.
Unlike the West, where steel demand is still recovering from the impact of the economic slowdown, he said, in India, steel producers would be able to pass on the input cost pressure to the consumers as off-takes are steadily growing. “Indian steel producers have to price their products higher in the next fiscal,” Panda added.
He further said the rising raw material costs are of “huge concern for bottom lines” of domestic steel firms and the 8-9 per cent growth in steel consumption would help ease pressure on manufacturers’ margins. (Agencies)
President of India condoles passing away of former Prime Minister of Nepal, Girija Prasad Koirala
The President of India, Smt. Pratibha Devisingh Patil has condoled the passing away of the former Prime Minister of Nepal, Mr. Girija Prasad Koirala.
In a condolence letter to the former Prime Minister’s daughter, Ms. Sujata Koirala, who is the Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Nepal, the President has said, “I am deeply grieved to learn about the demise of Mr. Girija Prasad Koirala. Girija Babu was a towering personality in the political arena of South Asia. He will always be remembered for his immense and invaluable contribution in bringing peace and democracy to Nepal.
Girija Babu was a true friend of India. He worked tirelessly to foster close and multi-faceted relations between our two countries. The people of India share the sorrow and grief of the people of Nepal over the loss of Girija Babu.”
The President of India, Smt. Pratibha Devisingh Patil has condoled the passing away of the former Prime Minister of Nepal, Mr. Girija Prasad Koirala.
In a condolence letter to the former Prime Minister’s daughter, Ms. Sujata Koirala, who is the Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Nepal, the President has said, “I am deeply grieved to learn about the demise of Mr. Girija Prasad Koirala. Girija Babu was a towering personality in the political arena of South Asia. He will always be remembered for his immense and invaluable contribution in bringing peace and democracy to Nepal.
Girija Babu was a true friend of India. He worked tirelessly to foster close and multi-faceted relations between our two countries. The people of India share the sorrow and grief of the people of Nepal over the loss of Girija Babu.”
MUNICIPAL POLL IN SIKKIM
The Election Commission will be issuing the notification over the fourth coming Municipal Election on 27 March, said Secretary. The nomination can be filed by the candidates for municipal election from 27 March for Gangtok, Namchi, Gayzing, Jorethang, Singtam and Rangpo for all the 47 wards, whereas from 27 March itself CODE OF CONDUCT will come into effect until the declaration of poll results.
The final date for submitting the nomination is said to be 3rd April, withdrawing nomination would be 5th to 7th April , declaration of result will be on 29 April ,according to secretary EC.
The final date for submitting the nomination is said to be 3rd April, withdrawing nomination would be 5th to 7th April , declaration of result will be on 29 April ,according to secretary EC.
Monday, March 22, 2010
Tax planning for women
Tax planning for women
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With a variety of options available, it becomes challenging for the woman taxpayer to choose the appropriate tax saving instrument.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kuldip Kumar
Chander Talreja
Income-tax is levied on individuals where they have taxable income. But when it comes to the women taxpayers, Government has given special concession to encourage then to become financially independent. The Income-Tax Act, 1961, provides for a higher tax exemption limit to women taxpayers as compared to males.
In the case of resident women taxpayer, the basic tax exemption limit is set at Rs 1,90,000 whereas for the male taxpayer, it is Rs 1,60,000. It means an additional tax saving of Rs 3,090. The limit increases to Rs 2,40,000 if the age of the taxpayer is 65 years or more.
This article looks at how women taxpayers can minimise their tax liability by making appropriate tax saving investments and/or utilising other deductions available under the Act.
Section 80C
Section 80C of the Act provides for a deduction of Rs 1,00,000 in relation to certain investments (tax saving instruments) or payments made by a taxpayer during the financial year.
The various investments which are eligible for deductions under Section 80C are: equity-linked savings schemes offered by LIC, mutual funds; unit-linked insurance plans for self, spouse or children; life insurance policies for self, spouse or children; employees' contribution to recognised provident fund; contribution to public provident fund; deposits in post office schemes such as — National Savings Certificate, Senior Citizen Savings Scheme, if it applies, and the post office five-year time deposits; term deposit with a scheduled bank for a period of at least five years; investments made in bonds issued by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development and debentures issued by specified companies,
In addition to these investments, the following payments also qualify for deduction under Section 80C: payment of tuition fees for a full-time education in any Indian university, college, school, educational institution (available for any two children); however, amounts paid for development fees or as donations are not eligible for deduction; and repayment of the principal portion of a housing loan.
Budget 2010 has provided a further opportunity to save tax where the taxpayer invests in notified infrastructure bonds.
A new Section 80CCF has been proposed to be introduced which allows a deduction of Rs 20,000 in relation to investment made in long-term infrastructure bonds to be notified by the Central Government.
Such deduction would be over and above the existing limit of Rs 1,00,000 as provided under Section 80C of the Act and would be available from next year (2010-11 onwards). The maximum saving could be Rs 6,180 (if the woman taxpayer is falling in the 30 per cent tax slab).
Saving instruments
With a variety of options available, it becomes challenging for the woman taxpayer to choose the appropriate tax saving instrument.
It would essentially depend on the actual circumstances of the each individual taxpayer as to what type of tax saving investments would suit her the best. The various tax saving instruments as discussed above carry a lock-in period — you may not able to withdraw your investments before the lock-in period or if you withdraw you may have to surrender the tax benefit you got at the time of making the investment.
Besides the lock-in period, there are several other factors such as the age of woman taxpayer, marital status, investment objectives, etc., which may also impact her decision to pick up the right type of investments. For example, where the woman taxpayer is, say, 22 and unmarried, she may need money in the near future for her marriage, further studies, etc.
In such a situation, she may like to invest in ELSS or keep the money with a bank or post-office in fixed deposits, which has lock-in period or three to five years rather than making deposit in PPF which has a lock-in period of 15 years or other long-term investments.
Where the woman taxpayer is in employment, she would compulsorily be contributing to the PF. As such contribution is eligible for deduction under Section 80C, she would need to consider those contribution to arrive at the net amount which she may need to invest within the overall limit of Rs 1,00,000.
Later, say, when she gets married and has family, she may utilise Section 80C differently. For example, where she has two school-going children, then besides PF, she would also need to consider the tuition fees she would be paying to ascertain the remaining amount to be invested in tax saving instruments.
Interest on loan
Where she borrows money to buy or construct a house, then she would also need to consider the principal amount she would repay during the year before arriving at the amount to be invested for tax saving purposes.
In such a case, the amount of interest paid on such loan is also deductible up to maximum of Rs 1,50,000 from her taxable income. It may be noted that where she buys or constructs the house jointly with her spouse and borrowed the money and are repaying the loan, then they both may be able to claim deduction of Rs 1,50,000 each for the interest and claim deduction under Section 80C for the repayment of principal.
Take another example, where both the husband and wife are earnings members and wife has her entire income at her disposal to save and she does not need money in near future, she may consider investing in long term tax savings schemes such PPF, ULIPs, etc., where money gets accumulated for old age. Even investing in another house for investment purposes may also be an option.
Medical insurance
Besides Section 80C, there are several other deductions available which a woman taxpayer can claim. Where she has taken a medical insurance for self and/or family (spouse and dependent children), she is eligible to claim a deduction up to Rs 15,000 (Rs 20,000 if any of the family member is a senior citizen). Further, where the medical insurance is taken for her parents, you will get an additional deduction of Rs 15,000 (Rs 20,000 if any of the parent is a senior citizen).
If she has contributed towards charity, deduction is available under the I-T Act up to 50 per cent (in some cases 100 per cent) of the amount donated to specified funds or institutions. Further, in case she borrowed money to pursue higher education for self, spouse or children, interest repaid on such loan during the year is also deductible under the Act. Such deduction is allowed over a period of eight financial years starting with the year when she starts paying the interest or tenure of the loan, whichever is earlier. There is no limit on the amount of interest that is claimed as deduction.
No special concession has been provided to the woman taxpayer in Budget 2010. However, the taxable income slabs has been amended to provide relief to all taxpayers having taxable income exceeding Rs 3 lakh. The maximum saving could be as high as Rs 51,500 for the taxpayers having taxable income of Rs 8 lakh or more. With more money in hands and the variety of options available, woman taxpayer can really make good use of investment opportunities while saving tax at the same time.
(The authors are with PricewaterhouseCoopers.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
With a variety of options available, it becomes challenging for the woman taxpayer to choose the appropriate tax saving instrument.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kuldip Kumar
Chander Talreja
Income-tax is levied on individuals where they have taxable income. But when it comes to the women taxpayers, Government has given special concession to encourage then to become financially independent. The Income-Tax Act, 1961, provides for a higher tax exemption limit to women taxpayers as compared to males.
In the case of resident women taxpayer, the basic tax exemption limit is set at Rs 1,90,000 whereas for the male taxpayer, it is Rs 1,60,000. It means an additional tax saving of Rs 3,090. The limit increases to Rs 2,40,000 if the age of the taxpayer is 65 years or more.
This article looks at how women taxpayers can minimise their tax liability by making appropriate tax saving investments and/or utilising other deductions available under the Act.
Section 80C
Section 80C of the Act provides for a deduction of Rs 1,00,000 in relation to certain investments (tax saving instruments) or payments made by a taxpayer during the financial year.
The various investments which are eligible for deductions under Section 80C are: equity-linked savings schemes offered by LIC, mutual funds; unit-linked insurance plans for self, spouse or children; life insurance policies for self, spouse or children; employees' contribution to recognised provident fund; contribution to public provident fund; deposits in post office schemes such as — National Savings Certificate, Senior Citizen Savings Scheme, if it applies, and the post office five-year time deposits; term deposit with a scheduled bank for a period of at least five years; investments made in bonds issued by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development and debentures issued by specified companies,
In addition to these investments, the following payments also qualify for deduction under Section 80C: payment of tuition fees for a full-time education in any Indian university, college, school, educational institution (available for any two children); however, amounts paid for development fees or as donations are not eligible for deduction; and repayment of the principal portion of a housing loan.
Budget 2010 has provided a further opportunity to save tax where the taxpayer invests in notified infrastructure bonds.
A new Section 80CCF has been proposed to be introduced which allows a deduction of Rs 20,000 in relation to investment made in long-term infrastructure bonds to be notified by the Central Government.
Such deduction would be over and above the existing limit of Rs 1,00,000 as provided under Section 80C of the Act and would be available from next year (2010-11 onwards). The maximum saving could be Rs 6,180 (if the woman taxpayer is falling in the 30 per cent tax slab).
Saving instruments
With a variety of options available, it becomes challenging for the woman taxpayer to choose the appropriate tax saving instrument.
It would essentially depend on the actual circumstances of the each individual taxpayer as to what type of tax saving investments would suit her the best. The various tax saving instruments as discussed above carry a lock-in period — you may not able to withdraw your investments before the lock-in period or if you withdraw you may have to surrender the tax benefit you got at the time of making the investment.
Besides the lock-in period, there are several other factors such as the age of woman taxpayer, marital status, investment objectives, etc., which may also impact her decision to pick up the right type of investments. For example, where the woman taxpayer is, say, 22 and unmarried, she may need money in the near future for her marriage, further studies, etc.
In such a situation, she may like to invest in ELSS or keep the money with a bank or post-office in fixed deposits, which has lock-in period or three to five years rather than making deposit in PPF which has a lock-in period of 15 years or other long-term investments.
Where the woman taxpayer is in employment, she would compulsorily be contributing to the PF. As such contribution is eligible for deduction under Section 80C, she would need to consider those contribution to arrive at the net amount which she may need to invest within the overall limit of Rs 1,00,000.
Later, say, when she gets married and has family, she may utilise Section 80C differently. For example, where she has two school-going children, then besides PF, she would also need to consider the tuition fees she would be paying to ascertain the remaining amount to be invested in tax saving instruments.
Interest on loan
Where she borrows money to buy or construct a house, then she would also need to consider the principal amount she would repay during the year before arriving at the amount to be invested for tax saving purposes.
In such a case, the amount of interest paid on such loan is also deductible up to maximum of Rs 1,50,000 from her taxable income. It may be noted that where she buys or constructs the house jointly with her spouse and borrowed the money and are repaying the loan, then they both may be able to claim deduction of Rs 1,50,000 each for the interest and claim deduction under Section 80C for the repayment of principal.
Take another example, where both the husband and wife are earnings members and wife has her entire income at her disposal to save and she does not need money in near future, she may consider investing in long term tax savings schemes such PPF, ULIPs, etc., where money gets accumulated for old age. Even investing in another house for investment purposes may also be an option.
Medical insurance
Besides Section 80C, there are several other deductions available which a woman taxpayer can claim. Where she has taken a medical insurance for self and/or family (spouse and dependent children), she is eligible to claim a deduction up to Rs 15,000 (Rs 20,000 if any of the family member is a senior citizen). Further, where the medical insurance is taken for her parents, you will get an additional deduction of Rs 15,000 (Rs 20,000 if any of the parent is a senior citizen).
If she has contributed towards charity, deduction is available under the I-T Act up to 50 per cent (in some cases 100 per cent) of the amount donated to specified funds or institutions. Further, in case she borrowed money to pursue higher education for self, spouse or children, interest repaid on such loan during the year is also deductible under the Act. Such deduction is allowed over a period of eight financial years starting with the year when she starts paying the interest or tenure of the loan, whichever is earlier. There is no limit on the amount of interest that is claimed as deduction.
No special concession has been provided to the woman taxpayer in Budget 2010. However, the taxable income slabs has been amended to provide relief to all taxpayers having taxable income exceeding Rs 3 lakh. The maximum saving could be as high as Rs 51,500 for the taxpayers having taxable income of Rs 8 lakh or more. With more money in hands and the variety of options available, woman taxpayer can really make good use of investment opportunities while saving tax at the same time.
(The authors are with PricewaterhouseCoopers.)
10,000 more PG medical seats in two years: Azad
The Centre will introduce a scheme to strengthen and upgrade State government-run medical colleges, generating 4,000 additional post graduate seats in 2011-12 academic year, Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad said on Monday.
This, along with increase in seats in private colleges, would lead to 10,000 additional PG seats in next two years, he said in his address at the convocation of Jawaharlal Institute of Postgraduate Medical Education and Research (JIPMER) here.
Under the scheme, for which a financial allocation of Rs 1,350 crore had been made, the colleges would be provided financial assistance so as to increase the PG seats and start new PG courses.
“I expect 4,000 more PG seats would be available in the next academic session (201112),” the minister said.
Listing various steps taken to bridge the gap in the doctor-population ratio, he said the government had rationalised the teacher-student ratio from 1:1 to 1:2 in PG medical education. This step alone had led to creation of additional 2,800 PG seats in various government medical colleges in the 2010-11 academic year, Mr. Azad said.
He urged the young medical graduates to volunteer themselves “to serve in difficult, most difficult and inaccessible (rural) areas” as a vast majority of people were still deprived of proper medical attention.
“We all owe our service to the rural India which has been the backbone of our agriculture, environment, culture and ethos,” he said, adding the government had initiated major reforms to provide better incentives to get the best health professionals where they were needed.
The Centre will introduce a scheme to strengthen and upgrade State government-run medical colleges, generating 4,000 additional post graduate seats in 2011-12 academic year, Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad said on Monday.
This, along with increase in seats in private colleges, would lead to 10,000 additional PG seats in next two years, he said in his address at the convocation of Jawaharlal Institute of Postgraduate Medical Education and Research (JIPMER) here.
Under the scheme, for which a financial allocation of Rs 1,350 crore had been made, the colleges would be provided financial assistance so as to increase the PG seats and start new PG courses.
“I expect 4,000 more PG seats would be available in the next academic session (201112),” the minister said.
Listing various steps taken to bridge the gap in the doctor-population ratio, he said the government had rationalised the teacher-student ratio from 1:1 to 1:2 in PG medical education. This step alone had led to creation of additional 2,800 PG seats in various government medical colleges in the 2010-11 academic year, Mr. Azad said.
He urged the young medical graduates to volunteer themselves “to serve in difficult, most difficult and inaccessible (rural) areas” as a vast majority of people were still deprived of proper medical attention.
“We all owe our service to the rural India which has been the backbone of our agriculture, environment, culture and ethos,” he said, adding the government had initiated major reforms to provide better incentives to get the best health professionals where they were needed.
Kerala’s panel moots realisation of Rs. 216 crore from Coke
In a setback to soft drink major Coca Cola, an experts panel set up by Kerala Government on Monday suggested legal steps to realise Rs. 216.26 crore as compensation from it for the “multi-sectoral” loss caused by its plant at Plachimada in Palakkad district.
The 14-member Committee, headed by Additional Chief Secretary K. Jayakumar, also recommended setting up of a tribunal to take the legal process forward since it would not be possible to the affected people to individually fight the legal battle.
The panel report, handed over to State Water Resources Minister N.K. Premachandran here, held that besides heavy withdrawal of ground water, the Hindustan Coca Cola Beverages Ltd. plant had inflicted harm to the farming and environment in the area by dumping solid waste.
It quantified the damage suffered by various sectors due to the functioning of the plant from 1999 to 2004 as agricultural loss (Rs. 84. 16 crore), pollution of water resources (Rs. 62 crore), cost of providing water (Rs. 20 crore), health damage (Rs. 30 crore), wage loss and opportunity cost (Rs. 20 crore).
Receiving the report, the Minister said it would be placed before the state cabinet to take appropriate steps.
The LDF Government had set up the high-level panel to assess the “socio-economic damage” allegedly caused by “exploitation” of ground water by the plant. The report incidentally came on a day which is being observed as ‘World Water Day’.
In a setback to soft drink major Coca Cola, an experts panel set up by Kerala Government on Monday suggested legal steps to realise Rs. 216.26 crore as compensation from it for the “multi-sectoral” loss caused by its plant at Plachimada in Palakkad district.
The 14-member Committee, headed by Additional Chief Secretary K. Jayakumar, also recommended setting up of a tribunal to take the legal process forward since it would not be possible to the affected people to individually fight the legal battle.
The panel report, handed over to State Water Resources Minister N.K. Premachandran here, held that besides heavy withdrawal of ground water, the Hindustan Coca Cola Beverages Ltd. plant had inflicted harm to the farming and environment in the area by dumping solid waste.
It quantified the damage suffered by various sectors due to the functioning of the plant from 1999 to 2004 as agricultural loss (Rs. 84. 16 crore), pollution of water resources (Rs. 62 crore), cost of providing water (Rs. 20 crore), health damage (Rs. 30 crore), wage loss and opportunity cost (Rs. 20 crore).
Receiving the report, the Minister said it would be placed before the state cabinet to take appropriate steps.
The LDF Government had set up the high-level panel to assess the “socio-economic damage” allegedly caused by “exploitation” of ground water by the plant. The report incidentally came on a day which is being observed as ‘World Water Day’.
ADMISSION NOTIFICATION: Sikkim University Entrance Test 2010-11
Sikkim University has announced the date of entrance test, which is conducted for admission to various courses, for the upcoming session of 2010-11. Sikkim University, which was established by an act of Parliament, is a central University fully funded by the Government of India. The University conducts entrance test in various test centers across the country, some of which are given in the following lines:
Aizawl, Allahabad, Bangalore, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Darjeeling, Gangtok, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Imphal, Kalimpong, Kathmandu [Nepal], Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai, Namchi [Sikkim], New Delhi, Patna, Ranchi, Shillong, Siligurim, Thimpu [Bhutan] and Thiruvananthapuram.
Courses
BA- MA in Chinese Language (School of Linguistics and Languages) [Integrated 5 year programme]
BSc-MSc in Psychology [Integrated Five Year Programme] (School of Social Sciences)
BA-LLB-LLM in Law and Legal Jurisprudence Studies [Integrated Seven Year Programme] (School of Law and Governance)
BSc-MSc in Floriculture and Horticulture Management [Integrated Six Year Programme] (School of Sustainable Development and Livelihood Management)
M. Sc in Physical Sciences (Physics) (School of Physical and Chemical Sciences)
M. Sc in Chemical Sciences (Chemistry) (School of Physical and Chemical Sciences)
M. Sc in Microbiology (School of Life Sciences)
M A in International Relations/Politics (School of Global Studies)
MA in Peace and Conflict Studies and Management (School of Peace, Conflict and Human Security Studies)
MA in Sociology (School of Social Sciences)
MA in Mass Communication (School of Media, Communication and Information Sciences)
M. Sc in Geography (School of Social Sciences)
MA in Economics (School of Social Sciences)
M Phil/ PhD in Microbiology (School of Life Sciences)
M Phil/ PhD in International Relations/ Politics (School of Global Studies)
M Phil/ PhD in Peace, Conflict Studies and Management (School of Peace, Conflict and Human Security Studies)
M Phil/ PhD in Sociology (School of Social Sciences)
Date of Entrance Test
May 8, 2010 (10 AM to 1 PM)
MA in Sociology
M. Sc in Microbiology
BA- MA in Chinese Language [Integrated 10 semester Programme]
MPhil/ PhD in Microbiology
May 8, 2010 (2 PM to 5 PM):
MA in Peace and Conflict Studies and Management
M. Sc in Chemical Sciences (Chemistry)
LLB-LLM in Law and Legal Jurisprudence Studies [Integrated 14 semester Programme]
MPhil/ PhD in Sociology
May 9, 2010 (10 AM to 1 PM):
MA in International Relations/Politics
M. Sc in Physical Sciences (Physics)
M Sc in Economics
BSc-MSc in Floriculture and Horticulture Management [Integrated 12 semester Programme]
MPhil/ PhD in Peace and Conflict Studies and Management
May 9, 2010 (2 PM to 5 PM):
BSc-MSc in Psychology [integrated 10 semester Programme]
M. Sc in Geography
M A in Mass Communication
MPhil/ PhD in International Relations/ Politics
Fee
Rs 300 (for General candidates)
Rs 150 (for SC/ ST/OBC / Differently Abled [DA] candidates)
How to apply
The prospectus-cum-application form can be downloaded from the University website – www.sikkimuniversity.in. The candidates can also receive application forms in person, from the Sikkim University Management building, located at 6th Mile Tadong, Gangtok after the cash payment of Rs.250/-. The applicants may also obtain application form by post with paying Demand Draft of Rs. 300/- in favor of Sikkim University. For further information, the students can visit the University’s website.
Last Date of submitting Application Form
April 20, 2010
Sikkim University
Contact Details:
Sikkim University,
6th mile, Samdur, Tadong
Gangtok – 737 102
Sikkim
Phone: +91-3592-251438
Fax: +91-3592-251438, 251020
sikkimuniversity@gmail.com
source: Barun Roy
Sikkim University has announced the date of entrance test, which is conducted for admission to various courses, for the upcoming session of 2010-11. Sikkim University, which was established by an act of Parliament, is a central University fully funded by the Government of India. The University conducts entrance test in various test centers across the country, some of which are given in the following lines:
Aizawl, Allahabad, Bangalore, Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Chennai, Darjeeling, Gangtok, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Imphal, Kalimpong, Kathmandu [Nepal], Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai, Namchi [Sikkim], New Delhi, Patna, Ranchi, Shillong, Siligurim, Thimpu [Bhutan] and Thiruvananthapuram.
Courses
BA- MA in Chinese Language (School of Linguistics and Languages) [Integrated 5 year programme]
BSc-MSc in Psychology [Integrated Five Year Programme] (School of Social Sciences)
BA-LLB-LLM in Law and Legal Jurisprudence Studies [Integrated Seven Year Programme] (School of Law and Governance)
BSc-MSc in Floriculture and Horticulture Management [Integrated Six Year Programme] (School of Sustainable Development and Livelihood Management)
M. Sc in Physical Sciences (Physics) (School of Physical and Chemical Sciences)
M. Sc in Chemical Sciences (Chemistry) (School of Physical and Chemical Sciences)
M. Sc in Microbiology (School of Life Sciences)
M A in International Relations/Politics (School of Global Studies)
MA in Peace and Conflict Studies and Management (School of Peace, Conflict and Human Security Studies)
MA in Sociology (School of Social Sciences)
MA in Mass Communication (School of Media, Communication and Information Sciences)
M. Sc in Geography (School of Social Sciences)
MA in Economics (School of Social Sciences)
M Phil/ PhD in Microbiology (School of Life Sciences)
M Phil/ PhD in International Relations/ Politics (School of Global Studies)
M Phil/ PhD in Peace, Conflict Studies and Management (School of Peace, Conflict and Human Security Studies)
M Phil/ PhD in Sociology (School of Social Sciences)
Date of Entrance Test
May 8, 2010 (10 AM to 1 PM)
MA in Sociology
M. Sc in Microbiology
BA- MA in Chinese Language [Integrated 10 semester Programme]
MPhil/ PhD in Microbiology
May 8, 2010 (2 PM to 5 PM):
MA in Peace and Conflict Studies and Management
M. Sc in Chemical Sciences (Chemistry)
LLB-LLM in Law and Legal Jurisprudence Studies [Integrated 14 semester Programme]
MPhil/ PhD in Sociology
May 9, 2010 (10 AM to 1 PM):
MA in International Relations/Politics
M. Sc in Physical Sciences (Physics)
M Sc in Economics
BSc-MSc in Floriculture and Horticulture Management [Integrated 12 semester Programme]
MPhil/ PhD in Peace and Conflict Studies and Management
May 9, 2010 (2 PM to 5 PM):
BSc-MSc in Psychology [integrated 10 semester Programme]
M. Sc in Geography
M A in Mass Communication
MPhil/ PhD in International Relations/ Politics
Fee
Rs 300 (for General candidates)
Rs 150 (for SC/ ST/OBC / Differently Abled [DA] candidates)
How to apply
The prospectus-cum-application form can be downloaded from the University website – www.sikkimuniversity.in. The candidates can also receive application forms in person, from the Sikkim University Management building, located at 6th Mile Tadong, Gangtok after the cash payment of Rs.250/-. The applicants may also obtain application form by post with paying Demand Draft of Rs. 300/- in favor of Sikkim University. For further information, the students can visit the University’s website.
Last Date of submitting Application Form
April 20, 2010
Sikkim University
Contact Details:
Sikkim University,
6th mile, Samdur, Tadong
Gangtok – 737 102
Sikkim
Phone: +91-3592-251438
Fax: +91-3592-251438, 251020
sikkimuniversity@gmail.com
source: Barun Roy
Burn those calories
by SHILPI MADAN
Wondering how to burn those extra inches when you have no time to work out? These calorie-burning chores will keep you looking great.
You made a New Year resolution with great aplomb to shrug off those unflattering inches. But lopping your locks hasn't helped you to clamber out of the chub rut. Of course, you are working and have absolutely zero time to spare for the gym routine, forget hiring a personal trainer.
Take heart. You can tap into the reservoir of household jobs to burn those callous calories. And, yeah, it ain't infra-dig.
There are a slew of activities that you could pack into your week. Shopping for groceries, lugging your purchases to the car and then into your apartment, and running after your tyke in and around the playground.
Get intensive and pour your energy into the calorie-chomping chores with a vengeance and watch the inches melt away...
Dust busters
Flicking dust particles off the shelves, furniture and knick-knacks gets you to bend the right way. You can even keep those arms shapely by polishing woodwork for good measure. Make sure you reach for the oft-ignored nooks, corners and crannies to zap away the layers of dirt. “I climb on the kitchen ladder and change the newspapers lining my larder once every fortnight,” says Seema Kapoor, financial advisor. “By the time I am through with a dozen-odd shelves, I feel as if I have had a gym workout.”
If your refrigerator stands in the cooking area, grease licks its complexion. Bring the scrubbing of electronic appliances and tiles once a week into your schedule, employing an effective surface cleaner. Of course, remember to encase your manicured hands in disposable gloves to shrug off the home-bee image. “Get aggressive,” shares Antara Sud, home-maker, “wiping the grime off fans helped me lose quite a few inches when I began my post-partum get-slim routine.”
Point to note: Since you spend a minimum of four hours a week tidying up and cleaning, work smart by turning the process into a meticulously planned workout and lose up to 200 calories an hour.
Bed it right
Bend it like Beckham. Whenever you make the beds, you bend and stretch. Just add a few more bends and stretches while you make all the beds in the house. This mattress mambo spells a super calorie crunch if you do it right.
“Try lifting the heavy mattress to sweep the sheet ears underneath, instead of simply stuffing the border along the sides,” suggests Urvashi Malik. “It gives me a sense of satisfaction that I am doing my bit to keep my room clean and flexing my muscles simultaneously while working those chubby pillows into their crisp cases.”
Remember to change the sheets as often as thrice a week to feed your fetish for cleanliness. And while you are at it, remember to wrestle with the mattress and side wraps in the baby cot as well.
Point to note: Avoid sharp swoops to prevent sudden muscle pulls along your back.
Clothes carp
The next time you groan and moan about your dhobi playing hooky, thank her for making you do the laundry. Gathering dirty clothes, shoving the linen into the washing machine and loading the dryer helps tone your thighs and improves flexibility. Of course, if you are blessed with a multi-storeyed habitat, the constant running up and down the stairs serves as a neat aerobic workout.
“There is no space to accommodate a dryer in my pigeon-hole drying area,” confesses Gauri Desai. “This makes it necessary to stretch out and pin the clothes on the lines outside the window. When I lean out, I can feel the muscles stretch along my waist.”
As you carry the basket of soiled clothes to washing machine, do some lunges. And, while you are folding clothes, work in a few sly butt clenches or calf raises to pump up those muscles.
Point to note: Perform the entire thing on your own: from bending down to fishing out the detergent to yanking open the dryer and opening the windows.
Score card
If you thought that domestic calorie management is infra dig, think again. Human resources specialist and mother-of-two Ritu Sharma says, “There is no time for a gym routine. I need to wind up home chores and have a quick shower in the two hours that my young one spends in playschool. Calorie crunching through cooking, tidying up and racing around my house comes to my rescue.”
The best way to crunch those calories is to sweep and swab, the traditional way, by using a broom and a mop. “Carefully observe your maid. She will have flat abs, great glutes, toned thighs and arms,” says fitness expert Leena Mogre, Director, Leena Mogre's Fitness Academy. “The continuous bending and straightening helps her burn more calories. Realistically, along with diet control, these exercises at home and a normal gym workout, you can easily shrug off2.5 kg per month.”
Point to note: Wear ankle weights and wrist weights while sweeping or scrubbing the floors.
Calorie Counter
You can burn these many calories during half an hour of:
Cooking (including standing and peeling, chopping vegetables): 120-150.
Dusting (cleaning fans, grills and windows): 120-150.
Gardening (picking up pots, working in the fertilizer, replanting): 150-180.
General housework (answering door bells, laying the table, answering the phone, filling bottles) : 120-150.
Clothes carousel (ironing, loading the washing machine, loading the dryer): 180-210
Lugging groceries from car till apartment and small bags to your car: 180-210
Tot Tidiness (Clearing toys, arranging the cupboards, keeping the kid's room clean): 200 to 250
(Leena Mogre, Director, Leena Mogre Fitness Academy)
From flab to fab
Use wax polish instead of a spray. You will need to rub harder for a super shine.
Avoid piling up items at the bottom of the stairs. Rush up and down with individual items.
Create excuses for re-runs. Stack the dishes in the sink, then run upstairs to do the dusting in the bedroom. Then downstairs to take the doorbell.
Keep dry clothes on the floor while ironing. You have to bend each time to pick up an item.
Knead the atta, wash the mixie, clean out your fridge and spruce up your electrical chimney. Discover new ways to work in the kitchen.
Play your favourite music and turn up the volume, it will help you polish and sweep that bit harder.
(Shalini Bhargava, Director, JG Fitness Academy)
Factoid: According to a new survey by the Discovery Channel, many of us find cleaning our homes ‘mentally therapeutic' and say it helps us feel in control of our lives.
source: The Hindu
by SHILPI MADAN
Wondering how to burn those extra inches when you have no time to work out? These calorie-burning chores will keep you looking great.
You made a New Year resolution with great aplomb to shrug off those unflattering inches. But lopping your locks hasn't helped you to clamber out of the chub rut. Of course, you are working and have absolutely zero time to spare for the gym routine, forget hiring a personal trainer.
Take heart. You can tap into the reservoir of household jobs to burn those callous calories. And, yeah, it ain't infra-dig.
There are a slew of activities that you could pack into your week. Shopping for groceries, lugging your purchases to the car and then into your apartment, and running after your tyke in and around the playground.
Get intensive and pour your energy into the calorie-chomping chores with a vengeance and watch the inches melt away...
Dust busters
Flicking dust particles off the shelves, furniture and knick-knacks gets you to bend the right way. You can even keep those arms shapely by polishing woodwork for good measure. Make sure you reach for the oft-ignored nooks, corners and crannies to zap away the layers of dirt. “I climb on the kitchen ladder and change the newspapers lining my larder once every fortnight,” says Seema Kapoor, financial advisor. “By the time I am through with a dozen-odd shelves, I feel as if I have had a gym workout.”
If your refrigerator stands in the cooking area, grease licks its complexion. Bring the scrubbing of electronic appliances and tiles once a week into your schedule, employing an effective surface cleaner. Of course, remember to encase your manicured hands in disposable gloves to shrug off the home-bee image. “Get aggressive,” shares Antara Sud, home-maker, “wiping the grime off fans helped me lose quite a few inches when I began my post-partum get-slim routine.”
Point to note: Since you spend a minimum of four hours a week tidying up and cleaning, work smart by turning the process into a meticulously planned workout and lose up to 200 calories an hour.
Bed it right
Bend it like Beckham. Whenever you make the beds, you bend and stretch. Just add a few more bends and stretches while you make all the beds in the house. This mattress mambo spells a super calorie crunch if you do it right.
“Try lifting the heavy mattress to sweep the sheet ears underneath, instead of simply stuffing the border along the sides,” suggests Urvashi Malik. “It gives me a sense of satisfaction that I am doing my bit to keep my room clean and flexing my muscles simultaneously while working those chubby pillows into their crisp cases.”
Remember to change the sheets as often as thrice a week to feed your fetish for cleanliness. And while you are at it, remember to wrestle with the mattress and side wraps in the baby cot as well.
Point to note: Avoid sharp swoops to prevent sudden muscle pulls along your back.
Clothes carp
The next time you groan and moan about your dhobi playing hooky, thank her for making you do the laundry. Gathering dirty clothes, shoving the linen into the washing machine and loading the dryer helps tone your thighs and improves flexibility. Of course, if you are blessed with a multi-storeyed habitat, the constant running up and down the stairs serves as a neat aerobic workout.
“There is no space to accommodate a dryer in my pigeon-hole drying area,” confesses Gauri Desai. “This makes it necessary to stretch out and pin the clothes on the lines outside the window. When I lean out, I can feel the muscles stretch along my waist.”
As you carry the basket of soiled clothes to washing machine, do some lunges. And, while you are folding clothes, work in a few sly butt clenches or calf raises to pump up those muscles.
Point to note: Perform the entire thing on your own: from bending down to fishing out the detergent to yanking open the dryer and opening the windows.
Score card
If you thought that domestic calorie management is infra dig, think again. Human resources specialist and mother-of-two Ritu Sharma says, “There is no time for a gym routine. I need to wind up home chores and have a quick shower in the two hours that my young one spends in playschool. Calorie crunching through cooking, tidying up and racing around my house comes to my rescue.”
The best way to crunch those calories is to sweep and swab, the traditional way, by using a broom and a mop. “Carefully observe your maid. She will have flat abs, great glutes, toned thighs and arms,” says fitness expert Leena Mogre, Director, Leena Mogre's Fitness Academy. “The continuous bending and straightening helps her burn more calories. Realistically, along with diet control, these exercises at home and a normal gym workout, you can easily shrug off2.5 kg per month.”
Point to note: Wear ankle weights and wrist weights while sweeping or scrubbing the floors.
Calorie Counter
You can burn these many calories during half an hour of:
Cooking (including standing and peeling, chopping vegetables): 120-150.
Dusting (cleaning fans, grills and windows): 120-150.
Gardening (picking up pots, working in the fertilizer, replanting): 150-180.
General housework (answering door bells, laying the table, answering the phone, filling bottles) : 120-150.
Clothes carousel (ironing, loading the washing machine, loading the dryer): 180-210
Lugging groceries from car till apartment and small bags to your car: 180-210
Tot Tidiness (Clearing toys, arranging the cupboards, keeping the kid's room clean): 200 to 250
(Leena Mogre, Director, Leena Mogre Fitness Academy)
From flab to fab
Use wax polish instead of a spray. You will need to rub harder for a super shine.
Avoid piling up items at the bottom of the stairs. Rush up and down with individual items.
Create excuses for re-runs. Stack the dishes in the sink, then run upstairs to do the dusting in the bedroom. Then downstairs to take the doorbell.
Keep dry clothes on the floor while ironing. You have to bend each time to pick up an item.
Knead the atta, wash the mixie, clean out your fridge and spruce up your electrical chimney. Discover new ways to work in the kitchen.
Play your favourite music and turn up the volume, it will help you polish and sweep that bit harder.
(Shalini Bhargava, Director, JG Fitness Academy)
Factoid: According to a new survey by the Discovery Channel, many of us find cleaning our homes ‘mentally therapeutic' and say it helps us feel in control of our lives.
source: The Hindu
A quarter century of Kanshi Ram & Mayawati
by Vidya Subrahmaniam
Ms Mayawati was neither Ambedkar nor Kanshi Ram; she had no time for lofty intellectual pursuits. She was blessed with enormous native intelligence and she was cast in the street-fighter's mould. The two qualities made for a lethal combination. Inside the Lok Sabha as outside, she came to be known for her acid tongue.
The image of Mayawati swaddled in a giant currency garland at the silver jubilee celebrations of the Bahujan Samaj Party brought conflicting emotions.
Who could grudge the BSP this supremely deserved highpoint? There are not many parallels to the story of the BSP. A party of the socially deprived making the rough journey to the seat of power in the country's most populous State is remarkable in itself. When that party wins a majority of seats under the leadership of a self-made woman of Dalit background, then the feat becomes immeasurable.
Which is why the currency garland is disconcerting. It was a needless appendage to a momentous milestone. The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister has much to celebrate and celebrate she must. But when she reduces the grandness of the occasion to a worship of currency notes, she detracts from her own implausible achievement.
True, her critics are the carping kind. They will ceaselessly disparage her even as they overlook the overabundance of her competitors' wealth. Perhaps there is also some merit in the view that the showmanship was a necessary signal to her core constituency, to tell Dalits that wealth is not the preserve of the ‘upper' castes. But 15 years have passed since Ms Mayawati first became Chief Minister. And it is three years since her party independently captured power. Surely, symbolism that once motivated and uplifted Dalits cannot indefinitely do so, and symbolism in perpetuity might even become an affront to their dignity and self respect.
My mind travelled to the early years of the BSP — and from there back to the present. It was the summer of 1988 and a horde of journalists, me included, had descended on Allahabad in U.P. to cover the by-election that set the stage for Vishwanath Pratap Singh to take on Rajiv Gandhi.
We obsessively followed ‘VP' on the campaign trail, and tracked down Sunil Shastri, the elusive Congress candidate. But there was a mysterious third candidate about whom we knew nothing. Then a strange thing happened. Almost overnight, the city was doused in the colour blue : little blue elephants covered every inch of the walls while bi-cycle riders carrying blue flags clogged the roads. The sight was truly something to behold. Kanshi Ram was the third angle of the triangular contest. But the BSP, formed four years earlier, was ideologically hostile to the ‘upper' caste media, and it took me many attempts to breach the barrier to the leader and his army of fiercely committed soldiers.
The effort opened my eyes to a whole new world. Over long stretches of conversation, we discussed institutionalised prejudices, the daily slights, and the media's refusal to even consider the Dalit point of view. I learnt why the BSP hated the word ‘harijan' : Are we orphans (they used a coarser word) that we need to become children of God? The words stung like arrows, and though aware of the purity of heart behind Gandhi's coinage, I pledged never to use the offending phrase.
Kanshi Ram lost the election but performed impressively, polling close to 70,000 votes in an election where he was up against a future Prime Minister.
Some three years later, the BSP founder introduced me to his understudy, a wisp of a girl with daring in her eyes. By then Ms. Mayawati was already a veteran of many Lok Sabha elections. Her vote trajectory was a harbinger of things to come – as much for Ms. Mayawati herself as for her party. Kairana, 1984: Third with 44,445 votes. Bijnor, 1985 : Third with 61,504 votes. Hardwar, 1987: Second with 1,25,399 votes. Bijnor, 1989: First with 1,83, 189 votes.
Ms Mayawati was as aggressive as her mentor was calm and reflective. Kanshi Ram was not a towering intellectual like Baba Saheb Ambedkar but he gave the BSP its philosophical underpinning. And what was the philosophy? One of his staunchest disciples, Ambeth Rajan, was fond of demonstrating it with the flick of his pencil. The standing pencil, with the Brahmins and other upper castes at the top, the OBCs in the middle and Dalits at the bottom, symbolised inequality at its worst. But the same pencil, laid flat on the table represented samta muluk (equal) society. But Mr. Rajan knew, as did Kanshi Ram, that what was possible in theory was not possible in practice. Thus was born the “opportunism” of the BSP. “Yes, we are opportunists. We will seize every opportunity that comes our way,” Kanshi Ram would say defiantly. It was a different matter that for the elitist media this deliberate “admission” became just one more stick to beat the BSP with.
Ms Mayawati was neither Ambedkar nor Kanshi Ram; she had no time for lofty intellectual pursuits. She was blessed with enormous native intelligence and she was cast in the street-fighter's mould. The two qualities made for a lethal combination. Inside the Lok Sabha as outside, she came to be known for her acid tongue. The more she lashed out at the manuwadis, the greater the motivational levels of the BSP cadre. Ms Mayawati's rabble-rousing skills made her an instant draw among Dalit voters, who thrilled to the guts and pluck of Kanshi Ram's heir. For Dalit voters, treated for years as a captive constituency by the Congress, the new, assertive BSP represented freedom, respect and a completely new way of thinking.
The confidence could be seen in the BSP's career graph. In just one decade, from 1989 to 1999, the party's strength in the Lok Sabha (out of 85 seats) went up from only two seats for a vote share of 9.93 per cent to 14 seats for a vote share of 22.8 per cent. In the 425-member U.P. Vidhan Sabha, the party's seat share rose from 13 for a vote share of 9.41 per cent in 1989 to 98 for a vote share of 23 per cent in 2002.
The decade also saw the BSP seize power through its stated policy of “opportunism.” In 1993, the BSP teamed up with the Mulayam Singh-led Samajwadi Party to stunning effect. Together, the SP and the BSP overthrew the Bharatiya Janata Party, then at the peak of its Hindutva glory. But soon, the applause died down. In June 1995, the Dalit-ki-beti became Chief Minister with the support of the BJP. The ideologically mismatched alliance shocked critics and friends alike. The BJP was the BSP's mirror opposite in terms of how it viewed the ‘upper' castes. Accusations of “opportunism” were again thrown at Kanshi Ram and his favourite pupil.
Yet in office, the BSP proved to be the BJP's nemesis. Between 1995 and 2003, the BSP aligned thrice with the BJP, and each time it grew at its partner's expense. Between 1996 and 2004, the BJP's Lok Sabha tally from U.P. plunged from 52 (of 83) seats for a vote share of 33 per cent to 10 (of 80) seats for a vote share of 22 per cent. Between 1996 and 2002, the party's seat share in the Assembly declined from 174 (of 425) seats for 32.5 per cent to 88 (of 403) seats for 21 per cent.
But the BSP was not content with this. Ms Mayawati had long ago convinced herself that her party had little to derive from pre-poll alliances. But post-poll alliances were fraught with tensions as could be seen from the repeated rupture of the BSP-BJP partnerships. The germ of a winning idea began here. The BJP-BSP alliance represented the fusion of ‘upper', OBC and Dalit castes. Rather than depend on an external ally, what if the BSP made this its own internal alliance? The implementation of the idea saw the birth of the ‘Brahmin jodo abhiyan' as well as the reaching out to other castes.
The new scheme of things saw Mayawati, the aggressor, turn into Mayawati, the community builder. The transformation was beyond belief. In building a caste coalition on its own terms, the BSP had come tantalisingly close to its founder's ‘samta muluk' vision. But the danger was that this could be strategy more than vision. Indeed, today, nearly three years after that fantastic peak, the BSP no longer looks that good.
In the 2009 Lok Sabha election, the BSP lost votes from almost all sections in U.P, including marginally from her own community of Dalit-Jatavs. An educated, socially-conscious community, the Dalit-Jatavs no doubt noticed that Ms Mayawati had allocated only as many seats to Dalits as there are reserved constituencies in the State. The BSP chief owed her success to them; they transferred their vote almost wholly to whoever she named. In return, they did not get even one seat more than their constitutionally sanctioned share.
The BSP is still the forerunner in U.P. Ms Mayawati's biggest advantage is her transferable vote bank. However, for this vote bank not to feel used and slighted, she must do more than wear currency garlands.
source: The Hindu
by Vidya Subrahmaniam
Ms Mayawati was neither Ambedkar nor Kanshi Ram; she had no time for lofty intellectual pursuits. She was blessed with enormous native intelligence and she was cast in the street-fighter's mould. The two qualities made for a lethal combination. Inside the Lok Sabha as outside, she came to be known for her acid tongue.
The image of Mayawati swaddled in a giant currency garland at the silver jubilee celebrations of the Bahujan Samaj Party brought conflicting emotions.
Who could grudge the BSP this supremely deserved highpoint? There are not many parallels to the story of the BSP. A party of the socially deprived making the rough journey to the seat of power in the country's most populous State is remarkable in itself. When that party wins a majority of seats under the leadership of a self-made woman of Dalit background, then the feat becomes immeasurable.
Which is why the currency garland is disconcerting. It was a needless appendage to a momentous milestone. The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister has much to celebrate and celebrate she must. But when she reduces the grandness of the occasion to a worship of currency notes, she detracts from her own implausible achievement.
True, her critics are the carping kind. They will ceaselessly disparage her even as they overlook the overabundance of her competitors' wealth. Perhaps there is also some merit in the view that the showmanship was a necessary signal to her core constituency, to tell Dalits that wealth is not the preserve of the ‘upper' castes. But 15 years have passed since Ms Mayawati first became Chief Minister. And it is three years since her party independently captured power. Surely, symbolism that once motivated and uplifted Dalits cannot indefinitely do so, and symbolism in perpetuity might even become an affront to their dignity and self respect.
My mind travelled to the early years of the BSP — and from there back to the present. It was the summer of 1988 and a horde of journalists, me included, had descended on Allahabad in U.P. to cover the by-election that set the stage for Vishwanath Pratap Singh to take on Rajiv Gandhi.
We obsessively followed ‘VP' on the campaign trail, and tracked down Sunil Shastri, the elusive Congress candidate. But there was a mysterious third candidate about whom we knew nothing. Then a strange thing happened. Almost overnight, the city was doused in the colour blue : little blue elephants covered every inch of the walls while bi-cycle riders carrying blue flags clogged the roads. The sight was truly something to behold. Kanshi Ram was the third angle of the triangular contest. But the BSP, formed four years earlier, was ideologically hostile to the ‘upper' caste media, and it took me many attempts to breach the barrier to the leader and his army of fiercely committed soldiers.
The effort opened my eyes to a whole new world. Over long stretches of conversation, we discussed institutionalised prejudices, the daily slights, and the media's refusal to even consider the Dalit point of view. I learnt why the BSP hated the word ‘harijan' : Are we orphans (they used a coarser word) that we need to become children of God? The words stung like arrows, and though aware of the purity of heart behind Gandhi's coinage, I pledged never to use the offending phrase.
Kanshi Ram lost the election but performed impressively, polling close to 70,000 votes in an election where he was up against a future Prime Minister.
Some three years later, the BSP founder introduced me to his understudy, a wisp of a girl with daring in her eyes. By then Ms. Mayawati was already a veteran of many Lok Sabha elections. Her vote trajectory was a harbinger of things to come – as much for Ms. Mayawati herself as for her party. Kairana, 1984: Third with 44,445 votes. Bijnor, 1985 : Third with 61,504 votes. Hardwar, 1987: Second with 1,25,399 votes. Bijnor, 1989: First with 1,83, 189 votes.
Ms Mayawati was as aggressive as her mentor was calm and reflective. Kanshi Ram was not a towering intellectual like Baba Saheb Ambedkar but he gave the BSP its philosophical underpinning. And what was the philosophy? One of his staunchest disciples, Ambeth Rajan, was fond of demonstrating it with the flick of his pencil. The standing pencil, with the Brahmins and other upper castes at the top, the OBCs in the middle and Dalits at the bottom, symbolised inequality at its worst. But the same pencil, laid flat on the table represented samta muluk (equal) society. But Mr. Rajan knew, as did Kanshi Ram, that what was possible in theory was not possible in practice. Thus was born the “opportunism” of the BSP. “Yes, we are opportunists. We will seize every opportunity that comes our way,” Kanshi Ram would say defiantly. It was a different matter that for the elitist media this deliberate “admission” became just one more stick to beat the BSP with.
Ms Mayawati was neither Ambedkar nor Kanshi Ram; she had no time for lofty intellectual pursuits. She was blessed with enormous native intelligence and she was cast in the street-fighter's mould. The two qualities made for a lethal combination. Inside the Lok Sabha as outside, she came to be known for her acid tongue. The more she lashed out at the manuwadis, the greater the motivational levels of the BSP cadre. Ms Mayawati's rabble-rousing skills made her an instant draw among Dalit voters, who thrilled to the guts and pluck of Kanshi Ram's heir. For Dalit voters, treated for years as a captive constituency by the Congress, the new, assertive BSP represented freedom, respect and a completely new way of thinking.
The confidence could be seen in the BSP's career graph. In just one decade, from 1989 to 1999, the party's strength in the Lok Sabha (out of 85 seats) went up from only two seats for a vote share of 9.93 per cent to 14 seats for a vote share of 22.8 per cent. In the 425-member U.P. Vidhan Sabha, the party's seat share rose from 13 for a vote share of 9.41 per cent in 1989 to 98 for a vote share of 23 per cent in 2002.
The decade also saw the BSP seize power through its stated policy of “opportunism.” In 1993, the BSP teamed up with the Mulayam Singh-led Samajwadi Party to stunning effect. Together, the SP and the BSP overthrew the Bharatiya Janata Party, then at the peak of its Hindutva glory. But soon, the applause died down. In June 1995, the Dalit-ki-beti became Chief Minister with the support of the BJP. The ideologically mismatched alliance shocked critics and friends alike. The BJP was the BSP's mirror opposite in terms of how it viewed the ‘upper' castes. Accusations of “opportunism” were again thrown at Kanshi Ram and his favourite pupil.
Yet in office, the BSP proved to be the BJP's nemesis. Between 1995 and 2003, the BSP aligned thrice with the BJP, and each time it grew at its partner's expense. Between 1996 and 2004, the BJP's Lok Sabha tally from U.P. plunged from 52 (of 83) seats for a vote share of 33 per cent to 10 (of 80) seats for a vote share of 22 per cent. Between 1996 and 2002, the party's seat share in the Assembly declined from 174 (of 425) seats for 32.5 per cent to 88 (of 403) seats for 21 per cent.
But the BSP was not content with this. Ms Mayawati had long ago convinced herself that her party had little to derive from pre-poll alliances. But post-poll alliances were fraught with tensions as could be seen from the repeated rupture of the BSP-BJP partnerships. The germ of a winning idea began here. The BJP-BSP alliance represented the fusion of ‘upper', OBC and Dalit castes. Rather than depend on an external ally, what if the BSP made this its own internal alliance? The implementation of the idea saw the birth of the ‘Brahmin jodo abhiyan' as well as the reaching out to other castes.
The new scheme of things saw Mayawati, the aggressor, turn into Mayawati, the community builder. The transformation was beyond belief. In building a caste coalition on its own terms, the BSP had come tantalisingly close to its founder's ‘samta muluk' vision. But the danger was that this could be strategy more than vision. Indeed, today, nearly three years after that fantastic peak, the BSP no longer looks that good.
In the 2009 Lok Sabha election, the BSP lost votes from almost all sections in U.P, including marginally from her own community of Dalit-Jatavs. An educated, socially-conscious community, the Dalit-Jatavs no doubt noticed that Ms Mayawati had allocated only as many seats to Dalits as there are reserved constituencies in the State. The BSP chief owed her success to them; they transferred their vote almost wholly to whoever she named. In return, they did not get even one seat more than their constitutionally sanctioned share.
The BSP is still the forerunner in U.P. Ms Mayawati's biggest advantage is her transferable vote bank. However, for this vote bank not to feel used and slighted, she must do more than wear currency garlands.
source: The Hindu
BE PASSIONATE, COMMITTED AND SUCCESS WILL FOLLOW
by RICHARD BRANSON
People often ask me what drives me--what motivates me to undertake new challenges. They also like to know how I got to where I am today and how I like to spend my time away from work. Here is a glimpse into my life and some tips for yours.
Q: What motivates you?
A: The opportunity to learn new things, try new ventures and meet new people. I have been very fortunate to have led an in- teresting life. Part of that has been because of my willingness, and Virgin's willingness, to keep trying new ventures.
Q: How important is money to you?
A: I pursue what I am passionate about, whether that will make money or not. Often I find that if you are really passion- ate and committed, you do better--and have a better chance of making the venture pay the bills. Money has enabled me to start up and support a number of philanthropic causes through Virgin Unite. I hope we can play a part in leaving the world in better shape than we found it.
Q: Whom do you admire personally and professionally?
A: I admire many people both personally and professionally.
One of the best things about my life is getting to meet many in- credible people on my travels and through work. We now em- ploy almost 50,000 people worldwide and, as often as I can, I pop into the offices to meet and talk with the staff. Not only do they all give 150% and really believe in what they are do- ing--which helps keep me going--but they're also great fun and love a party, which keeps me young. (Well, young at heart, anyway!) Outside of my friends, family and staff, here are a few of the people I admire: Freddie Laker, the founder of Laker Airways, one of the first “no frills“ carri- ers; Nelson Mandela, the anti- apartheid activist who spent 27 years in prison before he be- came president of South Africa; Desmond Tutu, the first black South African Anglican Arch- bishop of Cape Town, South Africa, who chaired his country's Truth and Reconciliation Com- mittee; Peter Gabriel, the successful English musician and songwriter (once the lead vocalist and flautist for the progres- sive rock group Genesis) who now produces and promotes world music and humanitarian causes; the late Mo Mowlam, who was the secretary of state for Northern Ireland when the historic Good Friday Peace Agreement was signed in 1998; and the aviation genius Burt Rutan, an American aerospace engi- neer who designed the Voyager, the first plane to fly around the world without stopping or refuelling, and the sub-orbital space- plane SpaceShipOne, the first privately funded spacecraft to en- ter the realm of space twice within a two-week period.
All of them have exhibited courage, talent and a zest for get- ting things done that I really admire.
Q: Who or what inspires you in life?
A: I have had great support from my family and friends. Two very different characters spring to mind. First is the late Steve Fossett, a dear friend and fellow adventurer. We first met when we were competing for ballooning records. In the end we com- bined our efforts, and Fossett flew around the world in the Vir- gin Atlantic Global Flyer, on one tank of fuel, without stopping.
He kept pushing and challenging himself, taking on the impos- sible and often achieving it. He has motivated me to try to do the same!
Mandela's life and story also have inspired me tremendously.
He went through many hardships with great dignity and strength. He has devoted his life to making his country and our world a better place.
Recently, we worked together with Gabriel to set up the Elders, a group of former world leaders who are using their knowledge and experience to resolve conflicts in the world. It is fascinating--extraordinary--to listen to this group of eminent global leaders and to see what they are trying to do to mitigate the causes of human suffering. Check it out on www.theelders.org Q: What is a typical day in your life? Is there such a thing?
A: I don't think I ever have a “typical day“. But when I'm home on Necker Island, I find it is the perfect place for work, play and life. I always wake early--I love that quiet time in the morning. Let's face it: I have the most beautiful office in the world--a hammock overlooking the British Virgin Islands! A fantastic place for reflection, it sets me up for the day and the surprises that are bound to happen. I come up with more ideas on that hammock than I ever would anywhere else. Plus we are well positioned from Necker to deal with all the time zones that the Virgin group operates in.
I like to start my day with a swim. After breakfast I hit the phone. I still far prefer talking to people to having email. I don't have set start and finish times. At the end of the day, I like to play tennis to unwind, then grab a drink as the sun goes down.
Q: How do you relax?
A: Since I travel so much, there's nothing better than heading home to spend time with my family and friends. I love to go kite surfing with my son Sam and my nephews, play a game of tennis with friends or sail around the islands. These are all good ways to unwind.
Q: How do you spoil yourself? Do you have any guilty pleas- ures?
A: I enjoy the occasional bar of chocolate--or one of my wife Joan's amazing fried egg sandwiches! BY NYT SYNDICATE ©2010/RICHARD BRANSON Richard Branson is the founder of the Virgin Group and com- panies such as Virgin Atlantic, Virgin America, Virgin Mobile and Virgin Active. He maintains a blog at www.virgin.com/ richard-branson/blog. You can follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/richardbranson. Your comments and queries on this column, which will run every week, are welcome at feedback@livemint.com
by RICHARD BRANSON
People often ask me what drives me--what motivates me to undertake new challenges. They also like to know how I got to where I am today and how I like to spend my time away from work. Here is a glimpse into my life and some tips for yours.
Q: What motivates you?
A: The opportunity to learn new things, try new ventures and meet new people. I have been very fortunate to have led an in- teresting life. Part of that has been because of my willingness, and Virgin's willingness, to keep trying new ventures.
Q: How important is money to you?
A: I pursue what I am passionate about, whether that will make money or not. Often I find that if you are really passion- ate and committed, you do better--and have a better chance of making the venture pay the bills. Money has enabled me to start up and support a number of philanthropic causes through Virgin Unite. I hope we can play a part in leaving the world in better shape than we found it.
Q: Whom do you admire personally and professionally?
A: I admire many people both personally and professionally.
One of the best things about my life is getting to meet many in- credible people on my travels and through work. We now em- ploy almost 50,000 people worldwide and, as often as I can, I pop into the offices to meet and talk with the staff. Not only do they all give 150% and really believe in what they are do- ing--which helps keep me going--but they're also great fun and love a party, which keeps me young. (Well, young at heart, anyway!) Outside of my friends, family and staff, here are a few of the people I admire: Freddie Laker, the founder of Laker Airways, one of the first “no frills“ carri- ers; Nelson Mandela, the anti- apartheid activist who spent 27 years in prison before he be- came president of South Africa; Desmond Tutu, the first black South African Anglican Arch- bishop of Cape Town, South Africa, who chaired his country's Truth and Reconciliation Com- mittee; Peter Gabriel, the successful English musician and songwriter (once the lead vocalist and flautist for the progres- sive rock group Genesis) who now produces and promotes world music and humanitarian causes; the late Mo Mowlam, who was the secretary of state for Northern Ireland when the historic Good Friday Peace Agreement was signed in 1998; and the aviation genius Burt Rutan, an American aerospace engi- neer who designed the Voyager, the first plane to fly around the world without stopping or refuelling, and the sub-orbital space- plane SpaceShipOne, the first privately funded spacecraft to en- ter the realm of space twice within a two-week period.
All of them have exhibited courage, talent and a zest for get- ting things done that I really admire.
Q: Who or what inspires you in life?
A: I have had great support from my family and friends. Two very different characters spring to mind. First is the late Steve Fossett, a dear friend and fellow adventurer. We first met when we were competing for ballooning records. In the end we com- bined our efforts, and Fossett flew around the world in the Vir- gin Atlantic Global Flyer, on one tank of fuel, without stopping.
He kept pushing and challenging himself, taking on the impos- sible and often achieving it. He has motivated me to try to do the same!
Mandela's life and story also have inspired me tremendously.
He went through many hardships with great dignity and strength. He has devoted his life to making his country and our world a better place.
Recently, we worked together with Gabriel to set up the Elders, a group of former world leaders who are using their knowledge and experience to resolve conflicts in the world. It is fascinating--extraordinary--to listen to this group of eminent global leaders and to see what they are trying to do to mitigate the causes of human suffering. Check it out on www.theelders.org Q: What is a typical day in your life? Is there such a thing?
A: I don't think I ever have a “typical day“. But when I'm home on Necker Island, I find it is the perfect place for work, play and life. I always wake early--I love that quiet time in the morning. Let's face it: I have the most beautiful office in the world--a hammock overlooking the British Virgin Islands! A fantastic place for reflection, it sets me up for the day and the surprises that are bound to happen. I come up with more ideas on that hammock than I ever would anywhere else. Plus we are well positioned from Necker to deal with all the time zones that the Virgin group operates in.
I like to start my day with a swim. After breakfast I hit the phone. I still far prefer talking to people to having email. I don't have set start and finish times. At the end of the day, I like to play tennis to unwind, then grab a drink as the sun goes down.
Q: How do you relax?
A: Since I travel so much, there's nothing better than heading home to spend time with my family and friends. I love to go kite surfing with my son Sam and my nephews, play a game of tennis with friends or sail around the islands. These are all good ways to unwind.
Q: How do you spoil yourself? Do you have any guilty pleas- ures?
A: I enjoy the occasional bar of chocolate--or one of my wife Joan's amazing fried egg sandwiches! BY NYT SYNDICATE ©2010/RICHARD BRANSON Richard Branson is the founder of the Virgin Group and com- panies such as Virgin Atlantic, Virgin America, Virgin Mobile and Virgin Active. He maintains a blog at www.virgin.com/ richard-branson/blog. You can follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/richardbranson. Your comments and queries on this column, which will run every week, are welcome at feedback@livemint.com
India plans four hydro projects in Bhutan
State-run power firms are planning to develop four projects in Bhutan as a means of harnessing the coun- try's hydroelectric potential as well as enhancing India's stra-tegic influence in the region.
National Hydroelectric Pow- er Corp. Ltd (NHPC), NTPC Ltd, Tehri Hydro Development Corp. Ltd (THDC) and Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam Ltd (SJVNL) plan to develop the projects with a combined capacity of 3,000MW through joint ventures, and im- port the bulk of the power gen- erated back to India.
The issue will be discussed when a team from Bhutan vis- its India on 23 March, power secretary H.S. Brahma told Mint. “We are planning to sign implementation agreements for four projects with Bhutan. While we are looking at devel- oping around 10 projects in Bhutan, four state-owned firms--NHPC, NTPC, THDC and SJVNL will be developing four projects through joint ventures,“ he said. “Around 90% of the electricity generated through these projects will be brought back to India to meet our energy demands.“
Bhutan, which is strategical- ly located between India and China, is estimated to have a potential to generate 30,000MW of hydropower, but has an installed capacity of just 1,490MW.
The move comes at a time when Chinese firms are going ahead with efforts to develop projects in Nepal. “While Bhu- tan is wary of China, it doesn't want to part from ownership of projects. They should join hands with Indian state-owned companies to develop their po- tential,“ said a senior government official, who did not want to be identified.
“We are planning to develop the 600MW Amochu project in Bhutan either through owner- ship or joint venture route,“ said R.S. Sharma, chairman and managing director of NTPC. S.K. Garg, chairman and managing director of NHPC, also confirmed the plans. “We have been requesting that at least we should get a project through the joint venture route if not on an ownership basis,“ he said.
“We have already submitted the detailed project report for Mangnechu project and are preparing the DPRs (detailed project reports) for 670MW Chamkharchhu and 1,800MW Kuri-Gongri hydroelectric pro- jects in Bhutan. We have been requesting our ministry in sec- uring the execution of these projects,“ Garg added.
India already has power-grid links with Bhutan and has helped it develop the Tala and Chukha projects. The two countries signed an agreement in July 2006 to facilitate, en- courage and promote the de- velopment and construction of hydropower projects and asso- ciated transmission systems, as well as trade in electricity.
India also has a memoran- dum of understanding with Bhutan to import 5,000MW of power by 2020, of which around 1,400MW is already be- ing imported. India has in- creased its energy diplomacy in the neighbourhood and has also been trying to engage countries such as Myanmar, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
India has a hydropower gen- eration capacity of 36,085MW and plans to add another 15627MW by 2012. While the country has a potential of 300,000MW, around 145,000MW is exploitable.
State-run power firms are planning to develop four projects in Bhutan as a means of harnessing the coun- try's hydroelectric potential as well as enhancing India's stra-tegic influence in the region.
National Hydroelectric Pow- er Corp. Ltd (NHPC), NTPC Ltd, Tehri Hydro Development Corp. Ltd (THDC) and Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam Ltd (SJVNL) plan to develop the projects with a combined capacity of 3,000MW through joint ventures, and im- port the bulk of the power gen- erated back to India.
The issue will be discussed when a team from Bhutan vis- its India on 23 March, power secretary H.S. Brahma told Mint. “We are planning to sign implementation agreements for four projects with Bhutan. While we are looking at devel- oping around 10 projects in Bhutan, four state-owned firms--NHPC, NTPC, THDC and SJVNL will be developing four projects through joint ventures,“ he said. “Around 90% of the electricity generated through these projects will be brought back to India to meet our energy demands.“
Bhutan, which is strategical- ly located between India and China, is estimated to have a potential to generate 30,000MW of hydropower, but has an installed capacity of just 1,490MW.
The move comes at a time when Chinese firms are going ahead with efforts to develop projects in Nepal. “While Bhu- tan is wary of China, it doesn't want to part from ownership of projects. They should join hands with Indian state-owned companies to develop their po- tential,“ said a senior government official, who did not want to be identified.
“We are planning to develop the 600MW Amochu project in Bhutan either through owner- ship or joint venture route,“ said R.S. Sharma, chairman and managing director of NTPC. S.K. Garg, chairman and managing director of NHPC, also confirmed the plans. “We have been requesting that at least we should get a project through the joint venture route if not on an ownership basis,“ he said.
“We have already submitted the detailed project report for Mangnechu project and are preparing the DPRs (detailed project reports) for 670MW Chamkharchhu and 1,800MW Kuri-Gongri hydroelectric pro- jects in Bhutan. We have been requesting our ministry in sec- uring the execution of these projects,“ Garg added.
India already has power-grid links with Bhutan and has helped it develop the Tala and Chukha projects. The two countries signed an agreement in July 2006 to facilitate, en- courage and promote the de- velopment and construction of hydropower projects and asso- ciated transmission systems, as well as trade in electricity.
India also has a memoran- dum of understanding with Bhutan to import 5,000MW of power by 2020, of which around 1,400MW is already be- ing imported. India has in- creased its energy diplomacy in the neighbourhood and has also been trying to engage countries such as Myanmar, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
India has a hydropower gen- eration capacity of 36,085MW and plans to add another 15627MW by 2012. While the country has a potential of 300,000MW, around 145,000MW is exploitable.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Simple lifestyle changes help you live long
Forget crash diets and obsessive calorie counting. A new study shows that it takes only slight changes to your eating habits to improve your long term health.
Cut back on the number of times you shake the salt cellar or grind your salt mill. A healthy adult intake is 6 grams, so even the smallest reduction has an impact on your health.
Research shows that dropping your salt intake by as much as 3 grams a day would be enough to trigger a measurable fall in blood pressure, reducing your risk of stroke by 13 per cent and heart disease by 10 per cent, reported dailymail.co.uk.
Reduce sugar in your tea or coffee from two teaspoons to one and you could save yourself up to 30 grams of sugar a day. At 15 calories per teaspoon, that’s a cut of 32,000 calories a year.
Avoid products with the words ‘hydrogenated fat’ in the ingredients list - culprits include low-cost cakes, biscuits and pastries.
Studies show that eating even small amounts of trans-fats or unsaturated fat increases your risk of heart disease more than consuming any other food.
Instead of filling your plate with carbohydrates (pasta, rice, potato) and meat, first fill half the plate with salad or vegetables, then split the remaining half between carbohydrates and meat. Like this can cut calorie intake by 200 calories.
Peeling the skin off your chicken drumstick before you eat it will immediately cut out 4 grams of fat without any sense of deprivation.
Make the switch from high sugar fizzy drinks (cola contains eight teaspoons of sugar in every can) to water and you will be reducing your sugar intake by 40 grams of sugar every time.
Adding one more serving of vegetables a day may reduce your risk of breast cancer by 21 per cent.
Forget crash diets and obsessive calorie counting. A new study shows that it takes only slight changes to your eating habits to improve your long term health.
Cut back on the number of times you shake the salt cellar or grind your salt mill. A healthy adult intake is 6 grams, so even the smallest reduction has an impact on your health.
Research shows that dropping your salt intake by as much as 3 grams a day would be enough to trigger a measurable fall in blood pressure, reducing your risk of stroke by 13 per cent and heart disease by 10 per cent, reported dailymail.co.uk.
Reduce sugar in your tea or coffee from two teaspoons to one and you could save yourself up to 30 grams of sugar a day. At 15 calories per teaspoon, that’s a cut of 32,000 calories a year.
Avoid products with the words ‘hydrogenated fat’ in the ingredients list - culprits include low-cost cakes, biscuits and pastries.
Studies show that eating even small amounts of trans-fats or unsaturated fat increases your risk of heart disease more than consuming any other food.
Instead of filling your plate with carbohydrates (pasta, rice, potato) and meat, first fill half the plate with salad or vegetables, then split the remaining half between carbohydrates and meat. Like this can cut calorie intake by 200 calories.
Peeling the skin off your chicken drumstick before you eat it will immediately cut out 4 grams of fat without any sense of deprivation.
Make the switch from high sugar fizzy drinks (cola contains eight teaspoons of sugar in every can) to water and you will be reducing your sugar intake by 40 grams of sugar every time.
Adding one more serving of vegetables a day may reduce your risk of breast cancer by 21 per cent.
Foreign university campuses to help India save USD 7.5 bn outflow
Assocham President Swati Piramal said, students going abroad, cost the country a foreign exchange outflow of USD 10 billion annually.
Allowing foreign universities to set up their campuses in India will help the country save up to USD 7.5 billion (about Rs. 34,500 crore) foreign exchange annually that students spend on studying abroad, industry body Assocham said.
“It will not only dramatically enhance profile of higher education in India but help it save outflow of about USD 7.5 billion of foreign exchange per annum as large number of Indian students go abroad to receive higher education,” Assocham said.
Assocham President Swati Piramal said, students going abroad, cost the country a foreign exchange outflow of USD 10 billion annually and foreign universities campuses in India could prevent at least three-fourth of students from leaving the country for higher education.
On March 15, the Union Cabinet approved a Foreign Educational Institution (Regulation of Entry and Operation) Bill, 2010, to allow foreign education providers set up campuses in India. The Cabinet clearance has paved way for its introduction in the Parliament.
The chamber said over five lakh students choose to go overseas every year to obtain higher education which include professional courses in engineering, medical and management.
Foreign universities in India would also prevent brain drain as large number of Indian students studying abroad opt to work overseas rather than returning home, Piramal said.
Assocham said several foreign universities have plans to enter India especially at places like New Delhi, Hyderabad, Chennai, Chandigarh, Pune and Mumbai
source:The Hindu
Assocham President Swati Piramal said, students going abroad, cost the country a foreign exchange outflow of USD 10 billion annually.
Allowing foreign universities to set up their campuses in India will help the country save up to USD 7.5 billion (about Rs. 34,500 crore) foreign exchange annually that students spend on studying abroad, industry body Assocham said.
“It will not only dramatically enhance profile of higher education in India but help it save outflow of about USD 7.5 billion of foreign exchange per annum as large number of Indian students go abroad to receive higher education,” Assocham said.
Assocham President Swati Piramal said, students going abroad, cost the country a foreign exchange outflow of USD 10 billion annually and foreign universities campuses in India could prevent at least three-fourth of students from leaving the country for higher education.
On March 15, the Union Cabinet approved a Foreign Educational Institution (Regulation of Entry and Operation) Bill, 2010, to allow foreign education providers set up campuses in India. The Cabinet clearance has paved way for its introduction in the Parliament.
The chamber said over five lakh students choose to go overseas every year to obtain higher education which include professional courses in engineering, medical and management.
Foreign universities in India would also prevent brain drain as large number of Indian students studying abroad opt to work overseas rather than returning home, Piramal said.
Assocham said several foreign universities have plans to enter India especially at places like New Delhi, Hyderabad, Chennai, Chandigarh, Pune and Mumbai
source:The Hindu
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