Pakistan finally has a prime minister. The man who has been selected to do the job is Yousuf Raza Gilani. He was in jail for five years during President Musharrafs regime, on charges of corruption

Finally, a prime minister

Business Standard

A substantial increase in government salaries has been long overdue, and the government should accept the broad thrust of the Sixth Pay Commissions recommendations without delay. The elite

Pay more, but also reform

It is seven years since the government permitted private sector companies to manufacture defence equipment, but only now is there enthusiasm amongst private Indian engineering giants. With India

Private sector in defence

Now that Tata Motors has Jaguar and Land Rover in the bag, all eyes will be on the firm and the group to spell out the strategy which has guided the acquisition. The deal, which has been months in the

A leap of faith

By the end of the year, the Andhra Pradesh government plans to give its rural pensions through the mobile telephone network, after a successful pilot has shown that the system works well. As this

Phone banking

The proposal by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) to cap charges for channels shown on direct-to-home (DTH) platforms at Rs 5 per month is in line with what has been allowed for those

Caps are a bad idea

The latest batch of entrants into the Rajya Sabha provides yet another occasion to ponder over the wonder that is India. There is nothing particularly remarkable about the new MPs themselves  if one

Reversal of roles

Inflation has emerged as the dominant macro-economic problem of the day, overshadowing another equally negative development, the slowdown in industrial production. For the week ending March 15, the

Find appropriate responses

Expectations about what the government can or wants to do on the reform front have reached so low that any movement is a positive surprise. The more liberal foreign investment regime that has been

Small bang reform

The Maharashtra governments draconian move to make food adulteration a non-bailable and a cognisable offence is as appalling as it is baffling. It is an abomination because it gives the police

Draconian

Talk of software giant Microsoft eyeing a partnership with  or buying a stake in  Internet player Yahoo, had been in the air for more than a year. Yet, when the final $46 billion bid (almost 80 per

Digital warriors

When newspapers reported several narrow shaves in the Indian skies, including a high-profile one involving UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi, the countrys civil aviation authorities responded by issuing

Grounding safety

A lot has been said on how the non-availability of large tracts of land is holding up the setting up of mega projects in India. In Orissa alone, as this newspaper has reported, projects with a capital

The ore`s the issue

The Central Statistical Organisations expectation of GDP growth this year, as reflected in its advance estimates, reflects a mild slowdown after two years of exceptionally rapid growth. Indeed,

Minor deceleration

Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action. So what about four and five times? Naturally, cyberspace last week was sucked in by happenings under the sea, and surfaced with

Unkind cuts

With Baba Amtes passing, India has lost someone who dedicated nearly half a century to the treatment of leprosy patients, and who also set up hospitals and educational institutions, mostly to treat

The last Gandhian

Given how environmental degradation and rehabilitation of displaced people have become so important, you would think that governments at the centre and in the states would be serious about dealing

Environmental farce

The US presidential race seems to be coagulating into some sort of shape. For Democrats, Tuesdays Potomac primaries, so known because they took place around the eponymous river near Maryland,

Watershed election

Indias information technology (IT) sector may be keeping its fingers crossed about the government extending the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) scheme beyond 2009, but the government

Anomalous tax breaks

Among the different economic regulators, the job of the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) is of more than ordinary importance. The roughly 3,000 firms that are traded have

Sebi`s tasks

The Cabinet decision to nationalise parts of 14 rivers for expediting the use of their waters for irrigation and power, with Central funding, is illogical though the objective is clear and justified.

Half-measures won`t do

Incisive columns and editorial comment by top opinion leaders

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